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SAILING 
SUNNY SEAS 



A STORY OF TRAVEL 

IN 

Jamaica Honolulu 

Haiti Santo Domingo 

Porto Rico St. Thomas 

Dominica Martinique 

Trinidad and the West Indies 



With Copyright Illustrations 
by 

ELLA WHEELER WILCOX 



CHICAGO 
W. B. CONKEY COMPANY 

1909 



f > 



Copyright 1909 

BY 

EI<I<A WHEEI^R WILCOX 



■ -. 



6.CLA2534J I 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Prologue 9 

Sailing Sunny Seas 11 

The Sea Breeze and the Scarf 13 

Jamaica 25 

Holiday Songs 27 

Taking the Sun 29 

The Problem 34 

Jamaica Again 37 

Moneague 42 

Ocho Rios 42 

Birds 43 

The Weather 43 

Port Antonio 51 

Port Antonio Harbor 53 

On The Parada 53 

Intermediary 55 

Honolulu 64 

My Heaven 70 

The Meaning of Sunday 80 

The Passing of a Princess 86 

Kaiulani 91 

The Color Line in Honolulu 92 

Foreign Missions 99 

Aloha Oe 109 

Jamaica Again Ill 

Jamaica 125 

Lincoln, February 12, 1809-1909 126 

Star Time in Jamaica 126 

The Cruise and the Circus 139 

Haiti 150 

Announcement 158 

Vaudouxism in Haiti 159 

5 



6 CONTENTS 

PAGE 

A Remarkable King 168 

Address to the King 172 

Santo Domingo 176 

Porto Rico 185 

St. Thomas ...192 

St. Croix and St. Kitts 199 

Antigua 212 

Dominica — Martinique 219 

Martinique 222 

Trinidad 227 

The Birds of Trinidad 234 

Caribbean Tragedies 239 

The Homeward Voyage 246 

To One Who Went Away 248 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



Frontispiece 




PAGES 




, 25 


to 63 


Nine Views of Jamaica. 


1W- 






64 


to 149 


A Famous Hula Dancer. 






Peacocks at Gov. Cleghorn's Place. 






Our Bungalow. Meekie, Jap Maid. 






Diving Boys Presenting Lais. 






Queen Liliuokalani. 






Type of Native Beauty. 






Princess Kaiulani. 






Bridge at Honolulu. 






Herself and Ah-Lui. 








150 


to 175 



A Shopping Street. 

Only Piece of Art Work. 

In the Market Place. 

The City of Aquin. 

Entrance Gate of Boudoin, Mr. Vital's Country 

Place at Jacmel. 
A Fellow Passenger on Voyage. 
Market at Jacmel. 

Santo Domingo 176 to 191 

Carnival Carriage. 

St. Thomas 192 to 198 

* Madame Minecke. 
Harbor View from Ma Folie. 

7 



8 ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGES 

St. Kitts 199 to 218 

Group of Natives. 

Watching the Pelicans Diving. 

Dominica 219 to 226 

Street in Roseau. 

Trinidad 227 to 248 

Egrets in the Garden of Queens Park Hotel. 
Coolie Woman at the Door of Her House. 
The Prison Island in Harbor. 



PROLOGUE 

We two make home of any place we go; 

We two find joy in any kind of weather; 
Or if the earth is clothed in bloom or snow, 
If Summer days invite or bleak winds blow. 

What matters it if we two are together? 

We two, we two, we make our world, our 
weather. 

We two make banquets of the plainest fare; 

In every cup we find the thrill of pleasure; 
We hide with wreaths the furrowed brow of care, 
And win to smiles the set lips of despair. 

For us life always moves with lilting measure; 

We two, we two, we make our world, our 
pleasure. 

We two find youth renewed with every dawn; 

Each day holds something of an unknown 
glory. 
We waste no thought on grief or pleasure gone; 
Tricked out like Hope, Time leads us on and on, 

And thrums upon his harp new song or story. 

We two, we two, we find the paths of glory. 



10 PROLOGUE 

We two make heaven here on this little earth; 

We do not need to wait for realms eternal. 
We know the use of tears, know sorrow's worth, 
And pain for us is always love's rebirth. 

Our paths lead closely by the paths supernal; 

We two, we two, we live in love eternal. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



"Were it not for the Star-in-the-East, we 
would take a little voyage to Cuba; but as it is, 
I suppose it would not be wise." 

It was Himself who spoke, long and long ago; 
in the late glow of a honeymoon two full years 
and more old, and bright with the added light 
of a newly risen Star-in-the-East. 

Now I had never journeyed farther than from 
the middle West to the Atlantic Coast, and 
south to Florida, and this suggestion of a sea 
voyage to summer lands and foreign shores 
fell like the call of a robin in mid-winter, 
on my ears. Himself had but given utterance 
to a passing thought, but he was forced into 
serious consideration of the voyage by my 
persistence. 

Consulting Those - Who - Are - Supposed - To - 
Know, he was told to gratify my desire. "She 
is young and robust and the voyage will do her 
good, since she longs for it," they said wisely. 

And so it happened that on a snowy day in 
February, Himself and I set forth on a none too 
large steamship, from the port of New York, 
bound for the harbor of Havana, on my first 

11 



12 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

ocean voyage. A gay party of interested friends 
saw us off, and our cabin was filled with fruits 
and flowers and books and magazines, when we 
reached it. 

Those five days on shipboard were marred by 
only a few hours of indisposition. The memory 
of that brief period of discomfort is gone, but 
the happy excitement of the other hours and 
days of that first sea voyage remains, to be 
called again to mind when recollection wills. 

Strangely enough I do not remember one fel- 
low voyager, or how many or how few there were. 
But I recall the kind solicitude of the good 
stewardess who made me her special care, and 
the watchful tenderness and hardly concealed 
anxiety in the eyes of Himself, I still see. 

One morning from my berth I heard Himself 
call my name. "See your scarf hanging by the 
porthole," he said. "It is carrying on a danger- 
ous flirtation with the wind. He is telling it to 
come out and see the world, and not hide itself 
in this small cabin. I think I will save the poor 
thing before it goes to its ruin. ' ' And he reached 
for my pretty blue scarf and saved it from being 
blown out to sea. 

That afternoon while he was playing a game of 
cards in the smoking room, I sat in the ladies' 
cabin and turned into verse his pretty conceit — 
of the "Sea Breeze and the Scarf." 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 13 



THE SEA BREEZE AND THE SCARF 

Hung on the casement that looked o'er the main, 

Fluttered a scarf of blue, 
And a gay, bold breeze paused to flatter and tease 

This trifle of delicate hue. 

"You are lovelier far than the proud skies are," 

He cried with a voice that sighed; 
"You are fairer to me than the beautiful sea, 

Oh, why do you stay here and hide? 

1 ' You are wasting your life in that dull, dark room ; 

(And he fondled her silken folds) 
"O'er the casement lean, but a little, my queen, 

And see what the great world holds. 

"How the wonderful blue of your matchless hue 

Cheapens both sea and sky. 
You are far too bright to be hidden from sight: 

Come fly with me, darling, fly!" 

Tender his whisper and sweet his caress, 

Flattered and pleased was she; 
The arms of her lover lifted her over 

The casement out to the sea. 



14 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Close to his breast she was fondly pressed, 
Kissed once by his laughing mouth — 

Then dropped to her grave in the cruel wave, 
While the wind went whistling south! 

However slight their claim to literary excel- 
lence, these verses have always been dear to me 
from their association. 

The approach to Havana occurred in the morn- 
ing, and the sight of Moro Castle, and the white 
walls of the city in the background, with a blue, 
blue sea in the foreground and the yellow tropic 
sunshine over it all, affected me like a strong 
wine; I was dizzy with excitement and joy. 

I had dreamed that I might sometime see 
such places, and one dream — my first sea 
dream — had come true. Born and bred on a 
Wisconsin prairie, I loved the sea as only inland 
and mountain born souls can love it. 

My month in Havana is a mingled memory 
of mental exaltations and physical discom- 
forts. Cuba was suffering under Spanish mis- 
rule at that time, and had only dreamed of 
freedom, while it had reached a point of audi- 
ble discontent, the beginning of insurrection. 

The hotels were dirty and ill kept; the beds, 
instruments of torture; the food a menace to 
health. But I bore all these miseries with the 
courage of youth and enthusiasm, because I 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 15 

was charmed with the climate, with the quaint 
narrow streets and odd little shops, and with 
the beautiful faces under lace mantillas peep- 
ing from behind mysterious "jealousies"; and 
the naked little children playing in the streets, 
clothed only in shoes and innocence, fascinated 
me. 

One day of that month stays like a distinct 
picture on the somewhat denuded walls of that 
room in the mansion of memory; one of 
those simple, uneventful experiences which will 
sometimes haunt the heart to the end of life. 

We took a car and went along the sea front, 
to a wonderful little rustic cafe, an arbor of 
vines growing over trees. And there we or- 
dered refreshments and sat long over cooling 
ices and talked of the days when the Star-in- 
the-East would become a brilliant fixed planet; 
and something fell on my hand and I was startled, 
seeing my first chameleon — a pretty little lizard 
— gazing at me with bright round eyes. In 
after years I grew to love this animal and to 
regard it as my benefactor, especially in 
Honolulu, where it is a foe to mosquitoes. 

Then there was another day when we went 
out and saw the one kind act to animals in 
Cuba; the bathing of the work horses in the 
sea. A stalwart man bestrode the leader, and 
rode bravely into the water, leading a chain 



16 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

of twenty or more, until all were swimming and 
snorting in the salt billows. Poor beasts, it 
was their few brief minutes of respite from 
hours of misery and abuse. Everywhere I 
had to shut my eyes in Cuba to escape the sight 
of cruelty to animals. 

One night we visited the Chinese theatre and 
sat in a box reserved for strangers. 

We did not, naturally, understand the Chi- 
nese language; yet the play was so realistic that 
it was impossible to miss the story. Indeed 
its realism savored of the Clynic; and was so 
frank and undisguised that Himself blushed 
(the first and last and only time I ever knew it 
to happen!) 

Then one day he left me in the hotel to write 
letters, and said he would be gone several 
hours. When he came back he was white and 
ill, and the look in his eyes was one of mingled 
humiliation and pain. 

"I was persuaded against my will," he said, 
"to go and witness a bull fight. I stayed but 
a few moments, perhaps a half hour, but it 
was a half hour among devils in hell. 
I cannot bear to think of it. It is incredible 
that such cruelty can interest men and women. 
They say it is greatly patronized here by tour- 
ists, American and English. I feel ashamed 
that any of my time and money went to the 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 17 

support of such a monstrous relic of barbar- 
ism." 

Four years after the Spanish war we visited 
Havana again. What a change! 

A Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to 
Animals had been established and the bull 
f ght was forbidden by law. 

The streets were cleaner; better buildings 
were replacing the old ones; the hotels were 
neat and well kept, the beds comfortable, the 
food excellent. The work of that great man 
and martyr to duty, Colonel Waring, was ev- 
erywhere evident in the freedom from dirt 
and disease which Havana enjoyed for a season 
under American management. 

But alas! with the advance of cleanliness 
and comfort, much of the picturesque had 
receded. The mantilla had given place to the 
plumed and flowered New York hat, and the 
distinctive beauty of the Cuban and Spanish 
type was frequently hidden and disfigured by 
the dreadful commonplaceness of the American 
shirt waist costume. 

The American visitor was not received with 
graciousness in Cuba at the time of our second 
visit, 1904. At this time I wrote of the condi- 
tions existing there as follows: 

"That Americans are unpopular in Cuba, he 
who runs may read. In hotels, in public con- 



18 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

veyances, in the shops, one may see it and hear 
it and feel it illustrated daily. The more ed- 
ucated and cultivated the Cuban, the more re- 
fined and subtle his methods of showing his dis- 
approval; the more ignorant, the more unveiled 
and outspoken his dislike. 

"In public places the Cuban man regards the 
American woman with a certain insolent fa- 
miliarity of glance; the Cuban woman's expres- 
sion is critical and often contemptuous, and the 
children on the streets are not infrequently open- 
ly disagreeable. There is a certain condescen- 
sion of manner in the hotel and shop attendants 
toward the Americans that is hard to bear and 
impossible to resent — particularly so, as not one 
native born and bred Cuban in ten speaks one 
word of English. 

"Sojourning in a hotel which has been packed 
all winter with Americans, I find not one waiter 
who knows what the word orange means and 
not one chamberman (for there are no chamber- 
maids) who understands the word hath, or 
laundry. An interpreter is sent for regularly, 
each time these words are employed. In the 
shops it is the same. Unlike the native French, 
the Spaniard or Cuban does not seem able 
to translate gesticulations. He is absolutely in- 
capable of grasping your meaning unless you 
speak the Spanish tongue. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 19 

"A gentleman who speaks six different lan- 
guages fluently told me this morning that he was 
in absolute despair regarding the business proj- 
ects which brought him here from Europe. 'It is 
necessary for me to visit many places and see 
many business men,' he said, 'and invariably I 
must seek an interpreter. Rarely do I find an 
establishment where any language save Spanish 
is understood.' The unpopularity of Americans, 
I am told, is largely due to the conduct of our 
soldiers stationed here during and after the 
Spanish War. One battalion particularly, compos- 
ed of the riff-raff of the States, in its rank and 
file, insulted Cuban women, and was so continu- 
ously and persistently obnoxious to the citizens 
in its utter lack of decency that an impression 
of American manners was made upon the Havana 
mind which will require more than a decade to 
eradicate. 

"Naturally, the more intelligent and cultivated 
the Cuban man or woman, the broader the view 
and the better the understanding of the situation. 
I have encountered a few residents of Havana, 
who realize and appreciate the debt all Cuba 
owes America, and who know how unjust it is to 
judge an entire country by a regiment or battal- 
ion of its soldiers. But the tourist here is, never- 
theless, made to suffer daily and hourly annoy- 
ances from the depredations and misdemeanors 



20 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

of that much glorified and vaunted being— the 
American soldier!" 

One night a party of us drove through the 
streets where law permits immorality to dwell 
unmolested. 

Often I have heard the question discussed 
among people interested in the welfare of the 
human race: 

Whether it was better to set apart a portion 
of the city for the occupancy of women of open 
immorality, or whether the interests of the 
race were better served by driving them from 
house to house, and temporarily purifying a 
neighborhood only to have the vice plague 
break out anew in another locality. 

Since this old social evil has, like leprosy, 
found no cure yet in the history of the world, 
which is the wiser treatment to follow? 

But after that night's drive through the 
streets of Magdalens in Havana, I have never 
in my own mind lacked an answer. 

No words can describe the sickening horror 
and profound sadness of a community of 
abandoned women, shameless, and unafraid of 
police interference, sitting in open doors and 
windows like human spiders in their webs, 
waiting for the passing fly. Little girls scarcely 
in their teens, brazen with sin; faded and 
battered old creatures, simulating a gayety 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS SI 

they could not feel; and all along the narrow 
street, block upon block of small houses on 
either side . crowded together filled with these 
wretched and depraved beings lost to ideals 
of love, wifehood, and motherhood, thinking 
only of selling themselves to the highest bidder. 

What vibrations of sin, sickness and de- 
spair, of animal passion, jealousy and greed, 
must go forth from such a centre as that! 
Better a thousand times to scatter such a popu- 
lation over larger space, to compel it to hide 
its face, and dissipate its strength by moving 
from house to house and from neighborhood 
to neighborhood, than permit it to gather 
evil force in such a community. 

Less horrible and less saddening was the 
visit we paid one day to the Leper Hospital 
in Havana. 

All my early ideas of that dread malady were 
changed by the experience of talking with 
nurses, doctors, and attendants who had taken 
care of lepers for many years. 

Leprosy is not a contagious disease like 
smallpox or scarlet fever. Its infection must 
enter the blood through carelessness or lack of 
cleanliness before it can be contracted. Among 
those who had performed the laundry work 
for the lepers of Havana for fifteen years, no 
case of infection had occurred. Antiseptics and 



22 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

scrupulous care were used, and the same rule 
was observed by the nurses. What a misfor- 
tune that fear and unkindness are cultivated 
in human nature by ignorance of facts like 
these. 

An average of 99 people in 100 in America 
think of a leper as a creature whose very pres- 
ence contaminates the air; as one who must be 
kept at a distance and fed through iron bars. 
There are few records of cruelty extant (since 
the days of Salem witchcraft superstition) 
more shameful than that of the treatment 
accorded a poor wretched leper in 1905 who 
endeavored to travel from Mexico to New 
York, in order to sail for his home in Syria. 

He was thrust from trains, driven into 
fields, and pursued like a savage wild beast 
or dangerous cobra, and all this in a Christian 
land by Christian people! 

The death of good Father Damien on the 
Lepers Island of Molakai, from leprosy, did 
much to still further incite fear in the public 
mind of the contagious nature of the disease. 
But while in Honolulu I learned the details 
of this case. Father Damien was a great, good, 
unselfish soul; but he was a man of careless 
personal habits, untidy in his clothing, and 
often neglectful of his bath. Living among the 
lepers as he did, and ministering to their bodily 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 23 

as well as spiritual needs, it was not strange 
that his careless habits caused the dread mal- 
ady to bring an untimely end to his noble 
career. 

It was infection, not contagion, however. 
Father Damien had failed to remember that 
"Cleanliness is next to Godliness," and he paid 
the price of such forgetfulness. The saint, 
as well as the sinner, suffers the penalty of a 
broken law of nature. Clean streets, clean 
homes, clean bodies, clean minds, clean food, 
clean thoughts and clean aspirations would rid 
the world of all diseases leprosy included. 

But because such a large proportion of the 
world lacks habitual and systematic cleanli- 
ness, lepers and victims of tuberculosis and 
all other scrofulous maladies should be kept 
apart from the general world until cured. It 
is kinder to them and safer for the race. In- 
stead of prison hospitals with small gardens, 
however, these sad souls should be given a 
domain as they are in the Hawaiian Islands, 
where they can experience such comforts and 
solace as may be found in human companion- 
ship, while enjoying the best care of skilled 
physicians and nurses, to lessen their unutter- 
able misfortune. 

One cannot fail to be stirred by the nobility 
existing in human nature when we see good 



24 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

men and women devoting their lives to the care 
of lepers. A sweet woman, "Sister Margaret," 
had been for fifteen years in the leper hospital 
of Havana, she told me. It was a joy to her 
to hear the English language spoken. She 
was originally from New York, of Irish par- 
entage, a sweet-souled sister of charity. 

Of all the shocking and sad sights I saw in 
that hospital, nothing impressed me so fright- 
fully as a bevy of little children (under twelve 
years), a sufficient group to form a school, 
all victims of leprosy. They were laughing and 
playing, unconscious yet of the horrible des- 
tiny which in all probability awaited them, 
a lingering death in life, death by inches. 

The day before my visit a man had died of 
some sudden malady — pneumonia, I think — ■ 
who for thirty-four years had been immured in 
the leper hospital slowly rotting away. 

It is fortunate that the minds of the little 
children I saw there, could not, or did not, draw 
conclusions from this occurrence of what fate 
might be theirs through all the years of youth, 
maturity, and into old age. 

Oh, when will science turn its attention to 
the wonderful hidden secret powers lying un- 
used in the universe, powers which will yet 
be used to cure all diseases, leprosy in- 
cluded. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 25 

That day shall yet come! 

"And the Star-in-the-East ? It rose only to 
set: never to shine again on our mortal vision. 
Yet somewhere in the eternal heavens it 
glows. 

JAMAICA 

The great Creator, shaping sun and star, 
Heard an archangel speaking thus : ' ' I dreamed 

I saw another Paradise afar, 

And all about it sapphire waters gleamed." 

The Maker smiled. At his divine behest 
The angel's dream, like some lush rose un- 
curled, 

To bloom forever on the warm sea's breast, 
The beautiful Jamaica of the world. 



JAMAICA 

There had been journeys by land and sea to 
Florida, to New Orleans, to California, to Eng- 
land, France, Belgium and Holland, before the 
next visit was paid to the West Indies. 

The weather was unusually severe and cruel 
in New York; heavy snows set in early in De- 
cember, and blizzards and bleak and cold rains 
alternated for two months, making life for man 
and beast a continual warfare with the elements. 



26 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

It was early in February when Himself broke 
the glad tidings to me, saying, "If you care to go, 
we will sail next week for a month in Jamaica." 
I did not know much about Jamaica, only that it 
was one of the West India Islands under English 
government; but my pulse leaped at the thought 
of a voyage into summer lands with Himself, 
at this time of the year. 

He was weary with that incessant battle 
which our competitive system forces upon men 
of business; and burdened with those small 
cares and worries which destroy comfort by 
day and sleep by night, like the hair shirt of the 
religious fanatic. 

But so soon as the date of our sailing was 
fixed, and once aboard the "Admiral Schley," 
plying between Philadelphia and Port Antonio, 
life assumed for both of us the aspect of a school 
holiday. It was such a trim little steamer: 
and our state rooms were cosy, our corner of the 
deck secluded and restful, and every hour led 
us farther and farther away from the rigors 
of the north climate and the realities of prac- 
tical life. 

"Business" became an obselete word; there 
was nothing in our present or our immediate 
future but pleasure and relaxation. 

With such a mental atmosphere, and with the 
staunch little ship plunging forward and over 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 27 

seas that changed from cold gray to ardent azure 
and dazzling green, and into tropical warmth, 
what could one do but sing! 

And so these little verselets came to be written 
and have their place here, in this personal 
record of southern sea travels, rather than in 
any book which lays claim to literary merit. 



HOLIDAY SONGS 

I 

Sailing away on a summer sea, 

Out of the bleak March weather; 
Drifting away for a loaf and play, 

Just you and I together; 
And it's good-bye worry, and good-bye hurry, 
And never a care have we; 
With the sea below and the sun above 
And nothing to do but dream and love, 

Sailing away together. 

Sailing away from the grim old town 

And tasks the town calls duty; 
Sailing away from walls of gray 

To a land of bloom and beauty, 
And it's good-bye to letters from our lessers and 
our betters, 



28 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

To the cold world's smile or frown. 
We sail away on a sunny track 
To find the summer and bring it back, 
And love is our only duty. 

II 

Afloat on a sea of passion 

Without a compass or chart, 
But the glow of your eye shows the sun is high, 

By the sextant of my heart. 
I know we are nearing the tropics 

By the languor that round us lies, 
And the smile on your mouth says the course is 
south 

And the port is Paradise, 

We have left gray skies behind us, 

We sail under skies of blue; 
You are off with me on lover's sea, 

And I am away with you. 
We have not a single sorrow, 

And I have but one fear: 
That my lips may miss one offered kiss 

From the mouth that is smiling near. 

There is no land of winter; 

There is no world of care; 
There is bloom and mirth all over the earth, 

And love, love everywhere. 




Jamaica. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 29 

Our boat is the barque of Pleasure, 

And whatever port we sight, 
The touch of your hand will make the land 

The Harbor of Pure Delight. 

The good Captain of this little ship was very- 
friendly and social with his guests, and one day 
we were asked to go on. the bridge and watch 
the taking of the sun by the sextant, a process 
which had always been a great puzzle to me 
until that day. And then another little verse 
come to life — 



TAKING THE SUN 

Let me take the sun, dear; 
Turn your eyes this way. 
(Poor the record and the score; 
Twenty thousand leagues .from shore — 
Head winds blow, and skies are gray; 
Better luck tomorrow.) 

Let me take the sun, dear; 
As along we sail. 
(Slow the course still seems to be; 
Winds abeam, and rough the sea; 
And I almost fear a gale; 
But, why trouble borrow?) 



30 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Let me take the sun, dear, 
Lift those eyes of blue; 
Ah! at last we're making time; 
Winds are fair and waves sublime; 
Tropic lands are right in view, 
So farewell to sorrow. 

When the flying fishes began to leap from the 
water and soar above the waves in flocks, great 
excitement prevailed among the passengers; 
and we two were among the most excited. 

We were living in an atmosphere of that 
wonderful poem of Kipling's, "On the Road to 
Mandalay." 

A fish flew upon the deck and was carried off 
by one of the crew, and afterward we secured 
it, all mounted, as a souvenir for our Bungalow- 
on-the-Sound. 

The skies grew more lustrous, the sea more 
rainbow colored, the sun hotter, and the cap- 
tain and officers appeared in white duck and 
the ladies in lawns and straw hats. 

Life seemed to have become a June morning 
in youth for all of us. It was a glorious after- 
noon when we sailed into the most exquisite 
harbor on earth — Port Antonio. Indelible is the 
impression made upon me by that first view, as 
we anchored in front of the old Titchfield Hotel 
situated on its noble eminence and surrounded 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 31 

by royal palms, with the majestic background 
of the Blue mountains in the distance. There 
were five distinct colors in the waters of the bay; 
there was tropical verdure everywhere and 
summer, and joy, and life was good; yet I grieve 
to say that we allowed this rapturous state of 
mind to be sunk in irritation and nervousness 
over the two hours delay caused by the health 
officer who had reported a case of sickness in 
the crew. It was only malaria, but it compelled 
us all to land in the dark. Perhaps the very 
late landing gave the greater zest to our morn- 
ing awakening. Rising at the first break of day 
to look out of the window, the overwhelming 
beauty of this tropic scene seemed a compensa- 
tion for every dark and dreary hour that life 
had ever known in the past. 

The old Titchfield Hotel is now replaced by a 
more commodious one; the most artistic and 
restful inn on earth. It is like a quiet wood, 
through which green roadways lead, always 
into peaceful nooks. Yet there was an indi- 
viduality about the old Tichfield which cannot 
be duplicated. The dining room was built 
about a mango tree; from whose branches hung 
luscious fruit, and vines and flowering plants 
were everywhere visible. 

Porcelain baths with hot and cold water were 
not included in its conveniences, but there was 



33 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

always the sea, which looked like a monstrous 
pousse cafe in a coral tub, and the water 
was always at eighty degrees. A homey air 
pervaded the hotel, and those days we spent 
there linger in the memory like a pleasant 
week end in a hospitable country mansion. 

We drove to Blue Hole; ten miles of exquisite 
panoramas; and there we met Dame Fisher, 
the notable colored woman who is a prosperous 
business woman and property holder, and we suc- 
ceeded in gaining permission to kodak her 
daughter, famous throughout the island for her 
beauty. There were drives to Swift River and 
Moorestown, each more wonderful than the 
other, and life seemed dyed in o-oalescent hues; 
and there was no world of care, and nothing 
commonplace, from horizon to horizon, or from 
dawn till dawn. 

The market sights at Port Antonio were cu- 
rious and interesting The optimistic patience 
and courage of the peasants seemed pathetic 
as we saw them in our drives, trudging joyously 
over twenty miles of mountain and valley to 
bring a shilling's worth of produce to market; 
and trudging cheerfully back again at the close 
of the day, with their small purchases. 

They were like children, these Jamaica peas- 
ants; and they greeted us always with pleasant 
words and smiles, and ofttimes tossed bunches of 




Jamaica. 




Jamaica. — Going to Market. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 33 

flowers into our carriage. The tremendous 
weights they carried on their heads, easily 
poised, surprised us. Once we saw a medium 
sized man walking to market with a live hog on 
his head; the feet tied so he could not move, and 
the mouth gagged so he could not squeal. 

Poor pig ! he was like a small manufacturer in 
the grasp of the trusts; and the same fate, prac- 
tically, awaited him. 

When the month was over, and business 
again stood in the foreground and sternly beck- 
oned, we went like slaves before a lash, back 
into the chill weather and the biting winds of 
March to take up the realities of life again. 

As we sailed past the old Hotel Titchfield 
in mid-afternoon, a group of new-made friends 
stood on the terrace calling "Good-bye — bon 
voyage — come again," through the megaphone. 

The "Buckman" which bore us away was 
one of the old "fruiters," badly balanced and 
poorly provided for the comfort of passengers, 
and it gave us one of our worst sea experiences. 
There was scarcely a dozen of us, and Himself 
and I were almost the only good sailors outside 
the crew, able to keep other than a horizontal 
position during the hard five days of huge seas 
and high winds which we faced in that rolling 
tub of a boat. 

Never was a poem written under more diffi- 

3 



34 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

cult conditions than "The Problem" which is 
given below. 

Sitting in the room which served as a ladies' 
cabin I was obliged to tie my limbs about the 
table leg to keep myself from falling to the floor 
as the ship lurched from side to side. A few 
lines of the poem were scratched off as the boat 
dipped to the left, and the next stanza would 
find me pitched almost on my back, with the 
table above me as I completed the line, before 
the starboard side of the ship came up again. 

The writing of the verses proved quite as 
much of a problem as the subject, which had 
been suggested by my first close study of the 
African race. 



THE PROBLEM 

Out of the wilderness, out of the night, 

Has the black man crawled to the dawn of 

light. 
Beaten by lashes and bound by chains, 
A beast of burden with soul and brains, 
He has come through sorrow and need and woe, 
And the cry of his heart is to know, — to know. 

You took his freedom and gave it again 
But grudged as you gave it, ye white faced 
men. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 35 

Not all of freedom is being free 

And a dangerous plaything is liberty 

For untaught children. In vain do you say: 

"We gave what he asked for, place and pay 
And right of franchise." All wrong, all wrong, 
He was but a child to be led along 
By the hand of love. Has he felt its touch? 
Nay, you gave unwisely, and gave too much, 
But gave not the things that his groping mind 
Was reaching up in the dark to find. 

They were love and knowledge. Oh, infinite 
Must be the patience that hopes to right 
The wrongs that are hoary with age, and 

brought 
To the level of virtues by mortal thought. 
And greater than patience must be the trust 
In the ultimate outcome of what is just. 
And in and under, and through and above, 
Must weave the warp of the purpose of love. 

Red with anguish his way has been, 
This suffering brother of dusky skin. 
For centuries fettered and bound to earth, 
Slow his unfolding to freedom's birth. 
Slow his rising from burden and ban 
To fill the stature of moral man. 



36 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

You must give him his wings, ere you tell him 

to fly, 
You must set the example and bid him try. 
Let the white man pay for the white man's 

crime, 
Let him work in patience and bide God's time. 

Out of the wilderness, out of the night, 

Has the black man crawled to the dawn of 

light. 
He has come through the valley of great despair, 
He has borne what no white man ever can bear; 
He has come through sorrow and pain and woe, 
And the cry of his heart is to know — -to know. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 37 



JAMAICA— AGAIN 

Four years passed (during which the second 
trip to Cuba had been made) when we followed 
the leading of our hearts, and sailed again to 
Jamaica, this time for the winter. 

A wonderful thing had happened. Another 
dream had come true. "Business," my only 
rival, was displaced. A life of strenuous labor 
was rewarded by a season of relaxation. 

Oh, the joy of it, as we sailed away on De- 
cember 20th, knowing that we had the whole 
beautiful winter ahead of us in summer lands, 
to dream, rest, saunter, read and write, and do 
as impulse and fancy willed. 

When we reached Port Antonio it was just 
sunset of a cloudy Christmas day. Over against 
Blue Mountain Range was piled a bank of pur- 
ple clouds, changing into splendid gold and 
red, and dyeing the water of the little bay to 
a deep rose hue, as we disembarked at the 
Titchfield pier. 

It seemed as it might to a wandering soul 
reaching Paradise at twilight. 

Keeping the memory of the old Titchfield in 
mind, despite the fact that we knew it was re- 
placed by a new structure, the first experience 



38 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

in the beautiful new hotel was one of disap- 
pointment and disapproval. Where was the 
old rural simplicity, where was the mango tree 
growing up in the center of the dining room? 

Where were the old "homey" porticos, with 
neighborlike people sitting about? all lost in 
splendid spaces of elegance and comfort. We 
were as unreasonable in our disapproval as 
the complaining parents of a daughter who 
comes home from college, a modish and cul- 
tured young woman, instead of the shy, awk- 
ward girl in calico who went away. 

Even after we enjoyed the luxury of a hot 
bath, and the delicious food served in the 
spacious treeless dining room, we still la- 
mented the lost old rookery. 

In fact, the full appreciation of what this new 
American hotel meant to tourists in Jamaica, 
did not come to us until we had made a tour 
about the island, and returned to finish the 
season in its comfortable and costly arms. 
On that return it appeared to me just as it has 
seemed ever since, a spacious wood, with 
mottled green roadways leading everywhere 
into cool grottoes: artistic: restful: delight- 
ful. 

On New Year day the hotel was crowded, 
and Jack London and his bright, agreeable 
young wife were among the guests. We four 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 39 

— the Londons and Himself and I — went over 
to the bathing beach for a wonderful swim in 
water a little too warm to be stimulating, but 
so beautiful and enticing that it was hard to 
leave it. 

Two days later we were traveling com- 
panions for a half day; we on our way to Mon- 
eague, in the mountains, the Londons setting 
forth on an equestrian trip across the island. 

Admiring the virility and force of Jack 
London's intellect before meeting him, if not 
always agreeing with his views of life and 
humanity, the brief personal acquaintance 
proved an interesting surprise. 

One cannot read London without picturing 
a man of aggressive and dominating qualities, 
strong willed and intolerant of the follies and 
foibles of the conventional world, and of the 
injustice of accepted industrial conditions. 

However these feelings possess him, his charm- 
ing personality does not betray aggressiveness or 
intolerance; nor do the lines of his palm indi- 
cate that bold defiance of conventions which 
one associates with him. A boyish face, an 
almost fragile form, a sensitive nature as deli- 
cately tuned as a wind harp, a gentle manner, 
and a winning magnetism — that is the memory 
Jack London left with us. 

Earnest, honest, heartily alive to the joy of 



40 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

life, loving the sea with a lover's passion, and 
happy to eat and sleep in the saddle, he was 
fortunate in the companionship of a young 
wife of similar tastes, eager and ready to fol- 
low the untrammeled course of life which he 
had laid out for himself. 

Yet they impressed me as imprudent chil- 
dren, who needed a wise guardian, and in Jack 
London's palm the life line is short; shorter 
in the right than in the left, too, showing that 
he is wasting his vital forces. After eight 
hours in the saddle one day, the Londons came 
back to the hotel and found us just leaving 
for the bathing beach. "Oh, wait until we get 
our suits and go along with you!" cried the 
impetuous young author. "But," I suggested, 
"a sea bath, — especially one accompanied with 
strenuous diving and swimming such as you 
indulge in, — should not be taken when the ner- 
vous system is tired. After eight hours in the 
saddle in this tropical climate, you must be 
fatigued." "Not a bit of it," he replied. "We 
are fresh as the morning." "But maybe we 
ought to rest a bit before going over to the 
beach," Mrs. London said. "We will see how 
we feel after we get to our room." And that 
evening she confessed to me that they slept 
two solid hours after removing their riding 
habits, which proved the fact that they were 




Jamaica. 




SAILING SUNNY SEAS 41 

fatigued and needed rest instead of added 
exercise. I would not like to be obliged to 
follow an itinerary made out by Jack London. 
The Londons found their horses waiting for 
them at Spanishtown, and left us there. We 
went on to our destination, Moneague, high up 
the Mount Diablo Range. 

It was a ten mile drive after we left the train; 
a drive of winding ascents and magnificent 
views, a continually changing kaleidoscope of 
tropical splendor. 

At the summit of one of the highest peaks 
spread a level plateau surrounded by a gently 
sloping valley, and beyond this valley in every 
direction were stately mountain ranges cov- 
ered with riotous verdure of shaded greens. 

The Moneague Hotel stood on this plateau 
and commanded the superb view and caught 
the mountain winds from every window and 
portico. 

Here we passed a happy, peaceful month, 
living on simple country fare, palatable and 
nutritious, finding excellent service, and en- 
joying the best sleep imaginable. 

Reading and writing, our regular occupations, 
were varied by drives to points of interest, "The 
Fern Gully" drive being one of the most memor- 
ably beautiful experiences of our lives. 

It was our first sight of ferns twenty feet high, 



42 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

and with leaves many feet in diameter. A trip 
to Sylvan Falls, too, disclosed scenes of astonish- 
ing beauty. 

Our mornings were given to books and letters, 
in our cool roomy apartments, opening out on a 
vine shaded portico. Many poems for maga- 
zines, and many prose articles, were written here. 
Among them were the following verses of local 
color: 



MONEAGUE 

A lovely princess, throned in high estate, 
And like a watchful army in command, 
The stately mountains round about her stand, 
While the four winds of earth upon her wait. 
Great orchestra of birds make glad her hours, 
And nature brings her gifts of fruits and flowers 



OCHO RIOS 

So fair this spot, the story of its fame, 
Into the still far mountain fastness came. 
Eight wondering rivers heard, and sought in glee 
This tropic marvel by a sapphire sea. 
And, gazing, all went mad with love, men say, 
And flung themselves in Ocho Rios Bay. 
Now, in the voice of Roaring River Falls, 
The mountain fastness for its rivers calls. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 43 



BIRDS 

At dawn the rainbow colors of the sea 

Took sound, and echoed from the great palm tree 

Beneath my window, so it seemed to me. 

I looked, and saw it was the music spray 

A mocking bird gushed out to greet the day. 



THE WEATHER 

There are just two kinds of weather 

On this fair Jamaica Isle: 
First the glowing golden sunshine, 

That makes all the tourists smile. 
Then it rains, and all the planters 

Beam with pleasure, and they say, 
"It is silver dollar weather 

We are having here today." 

Every afternoon we walked for an hour or two 
along the hard fine roads which lead through 
beautiful woodland scenes, and our regret was 
that we could not climb the lovely mountain 
sides, or wander through the fields. 

Knowing that the mongoose (the St. Patrick 
of Jamaica) had destroyed all serpents, we 
imagined such pedestrian trips would form a 



44 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

part of our entertainment. But we had counted 
without the Jamaican pest — the "tick." This 
infinitesimal insect inhabits the grass, and is 
said to be bred by the cattle. Once upon a time 
it was kept in subjection by the birds which 
filled the fields and woods of Jamaica, and found 
the insect a good diet. But the mongoose, im- 
ported from East India to destroy rats and ser- 
pents, extended his slaughter into the bird 
kingdom to such an extent that the malicious 
little "tick" has been enabled to propagate its 
species, and make life uncomfortable for animals 
and men who venture into its domain, the grass. 

Fortunate for humanity, this insect can neither 
leap nor fly; and so one who "keeps off the 
grass" is immune from its persecutions. 

In all our walks along the hard white roads, I 
became the victim of only one "tick." 

But an English lady who had not been warned, 
and who climbed an attractive looking hillside 
the day after her arrival, was obliged to lie in 
bed with bandaged limbs for more than a week. 

This vicious speck of animal life is smaller than 
the smallest atom of black pepper; and attached 
to a human foot or ankle, it proceeds to bore 
under the cuticle and hide itself; and unless 
immediately removed (a difficult process) it 
produces angry swelling and intolerable itching. 

Afflicted in this manner one day, and unable to 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 45 

detect the slightest sign of an insect, I was con- 
vinced by my chambermaid, who dug her sharp 
finger nails into my flesh and produced the 
offending intruder, an almost invisible electron 
of dust. 

"Rebecca" was a mountain born and bred 
maid of color, childlike and simple as they all are. 

The day we arrived in Moneague the mountain 
winds subsided as usual about 4 o'clock, and in 
my room I heard (what at Port Antonio I had 
never heard) the hum of a mosquito. 

"I see there are no screens at the windows or 
doors, Rebecca," I said; "I fear we will be eaten 
up by mosquitos." 

"Don't need no screens, Mistress," Rebecca 
replied. 

"But I heard a mosquito this minute," I 
answered. 

"Yes'm," Rebecca said, as she went on about 
her work, "but de muskiter done go to sleep 
when de light is out and don't bother no one." 

And sure enough Rebecca's word proved true. 
The mosquito, a feeble specimen, appeared at 
this season of the year only between four and 
six in the afternoon, as if invited to an afternoon 
tea; and he politely made his departure after six 
and was heard no more that night. Later in 
the winter, or earlier in the spring, I have heard 
that he is less formal and more obtrusive. 



46 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Fascinated by the peculiar bell-like notes of a 
bird outside my window, I asked its name, and 
Rebecca answered me, saying it was the "Ting- 
a-ling." I learned afterward that it is the 
Jamaican name generally given to the black- 
bird, which, in sufficient numbers, keeps the 
"tick" in subjection. In our walks we often 
saw a half dozen of these blackbirds riding on 
the back of a cow busily engaged in eating the 
ticks. That the poor beasts allow the birds to 
settle on their backs and heads without protest 
and allow them to ride free of charge, can be 
readily understood. 

The song of the "Ting-a-ling" is sweet and 
plaintively musical, like the chime of small 
bells. 

The mocking bird used to sit on a tree just in 
front of our portico, and pour out fountains of 
song, and on several nights I was enchanted by 
the wonderful music of the nightingale. 

A large banyan tree grew a few yards from 
the window at the north side of our rooms. 

One afternoon I heard the unmistakable cry 
of a small kitten from the region of the banyan 
tree. 

Now, while all animals are dear to my heart, 
feline creatures have always possessed a peculiar 
fascination for me; and Himself owns to a simi- 
lar predilection. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 47 

Therefore the cry of this kitten seemed a direct 
appeal to me for help, and I set forth to find the 
furry atom of life from whence the cry proceeded. 

Animals know no God but man, and if man 
makes no answer when the animal cries, how 
should he dare pray to God for help in his own 
hour of trial? 

Following the repeated mew of the kitten, I 
found a tiny fur ball lying at the foot of the 
banyan tree; and hearing a louder cry above me, 
I looked up and discovered the most astonishing 
thing — a mother cat and four kittens lying in a 
nest in the tree six feet above the ground. 

The nest was formed by the branching of the 
tree at that height, and a deposit of fallen leaves 
in the conjunction of branches made a most 
comfortable bed for the cat family. The mother 
cat was thin and indolent, and between the 
taxing tropical climate ana tour ravenous babies, 
she lacked the ambition to rescue the kitten 
when it fell from the perch. After restoring 
the adventurous infant four times in the after- 
noon, I decided to move the family to more com- 
fortable quarters, and so that evening found 
Pussy Cat and her five kittens installed in a 
commodious soap box under my writing table. 
Every one predicted her early departure, and 
return to the banyan tree, cat fashion. But not 
until the day before our departure did Pussy 



48 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

show the slightest desire to leave her comfort- 
able quarters. 

I fed her three times a day on the fat of the 
land; fish, fowl, flesh, cream (taken from the 
breakfast table, to the amazement of the colored 
waiters), and I was just beginning to teach the 
little family to lap milk, when we decided rather 
suddenly to return to Port Antonio. 

Feeling a certain responsibility about my pets, 
I went to the room of one of the English ladies 
residing in the hotel, and asked her if she would 
concern herself about the pussies and see that 
they were fed after my departure. She amiably 
consented, and said the feline family could oc- 
cupy a corner of the portico outside her room. 
But what was my surprise, on returning to 
my apartment, to find that Madame Puss had 
taken the matter in her own hands (or rather 
the kittens in her mouth) and moved them every 
one, up two flights of stairs to the housekeeper's 
room. She had no doubt sensed my approach- 
ing, departure, with that weird sixth sense so 
many animals possess, and decided on the place 
she would prefer to occupy. 

She had grown so fat under my care, and the 
kittens were so robust, that I left my charges 
with confidence that their immediate future 
would be a reasonably comfortable one. 

The morning of our departure was another of 




Jamaica. 




Jamaica. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 49 

those occasions which remains forever vivid and 
distinct in memory. 

We were to drive to Spanishtown and take 
the eight o'clock train to Port Antonio. This 
necessitated leaving Moneague at five o'clock. 

"Topping," our favorite coachman, was at the 
door with two good mules and a comfortable 
carriage. But the morning was as black as a 
full blooded young maid of the Jamaican Moun- 
tains; and we could see nothing, as we felt our 
way along the veranda, save the glimmering 
lanterns attached to the carriage. No shadow, 
even, of horses or driver was discernible. 

Slowly, as we made our way along the wind- 
ing road, the shapes of Topping and the mules 
came out like negatives on a kodak film; then 
like developed prints; and next we saw the 
mountains appearing from the mist. A few 
moments later, from our high altitude we looked 
down into a valley filled with rushing billows. 

"Why, Topping," I cried, "I never knew 
there was a river in that valley before!" 

"That's no river, Mistress," Topping answered 
— "that's clouds." And sure enough we were 
above the clouds, looking down upon them; 
and in another half hour the sun had arisen 
and touched with glory all that splendid mass, 
and we drove on through the opulent verdure 
of the mountain scenery, bathed in light, 



50 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

beauty and joy, feeling the wonder of God's 
great universe, and the thrill of the universal 
life, and the privilege of personal companion- 
ship, with a new sense of gratitude. 

The hot railroad trip was made endurable 
by cool winds and by the continual panorama 
of magnificent scenery between Spanishtown 
and Port Antonio. There are few more pic- 
turesque scenes on earth than the Bog walk 
drive of Jamaica. 

Back into the comfort and charm and artis- 
tic beauty of Hotel Titchfield, we forgot our 
old grudge against it as the displacer of the 
former rustic structure, and there and then 
swore our allegience to it as the loveliest hotel 
in the world. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 51 



PORT ANTONIO 

During our first visit to Jamaica the same 
thorn had pierced my flesh that caused me so 
much suffering in Cuba. This was the utter 
indifference of human beings to the suffering 
of animals. 

Drives which would have meant happiness, 
made misery for me, and scenes which God 
rendered radiant, man turned dark with tor- 
ment by the continual lashing of ill-fed and 
overworked animals. Perpetual protests were 
on my lips, and I was obliged to be unpleas- 
antly conspicuous on several occasions, and to 
suffer the consequent disagreeable notoriety, as 
an open defender of dumb beasts among the 
ignorant or the indifferent, who called such 
championship of voiceless creatures, " eccen- 
tric." It was either this, or else remain shame- 
fully silent, and suffer the cruelty to continue 
without protest. Drivers began to point me 
out and laugh among themselves when they 
saw me approach; but I had the satisfaction of 
saving many a miserable mule, donkey and 
horse cruel blows, and of knowing that I had 
possibly planted a little seed of thought on the 
subject of our responsibility toward animals 
in a few crude minds. 



52 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

On my second visit to Jamaica it was a sur- 
prise and a delight to find a society for the pro- 
tection of animals organized in the Island and 
doing excellent work. Judge and Mrs. Lumb, 
aided by Mrs. Perry, had accomplished this 
great undertaking. Already there was a differ- 
ent feeling on the subject among the owners 
and drivers of animals; a half awakened con- 
sciousness of the rights of dumb beasts to 
decent treatment, even when that conscious- 
ness was not carried into action. It was my 
desire to be of aid to the Humane Society, 
and besides a personal contribution, to give it 
a new impetus. 

The way opened through the little Hotel 
Titchfield bulletin called "The Port Antonio 
Morning News." It was published by the 
management merely to give stock reports and 
arrivals of guests; but a souvenir number was 
arranged for February 22nd, in which the 
printer, Mr. Hadley, a man of remarkable genius 
in his line, and I, collaborated in an effort 
to make the number of more than momentary 
interest. So well we succeeded, that there was 
a demand for another; and I requested the 
manager to allow this to be the "Animal Edition' ' 
and to be sold for the benefit of the Society — 
instead of being presented to the guests. 

It appeared the morning before we sailed 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 53 

for Boston, and netted the society something 
over £15, I believe. 

Some of the verses written for this special 
souvenir edition of the 'Tort Antonio News" 
are appended. 



PORT ANTONIO HARBOR 

This darling of the Southern Sea, afar 

The great Blue Mountain worships from his 

height; 
Sometimes to hide his passion from her sight, 
He pins a cloud about him with a star, 
And shuts away the vision of her charms, 
Lying encircled by her lover's arms, 
While high above him hangs the Southern 

Cross, 
To typify his sorrow and his loss. 



ON THE PARADA 

A radiant sea, and a smiling sky 

And a tropical sun above us. 

Two proud banners, that watch close by, 

And somebody near to love us. 

Friends in the foreground, and ships in the bay, 

And its ho! and hail! to a holiday. 



54 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



WELCOME TO THE TOURISTS 

Here's a welcome to the tourist 
On this fair West Indian Isle, 
May you find the skies above you 
Just one bright eternal smile; 
May the mountains and the valleys, 
And the climate, and the sea, 
Prove as full of balm and beauty 
As you fancied they would be. 

But remember in your seeking 
After pleasure, this one thing: 
You will find no more contentment 
Anywhere than what you bring. 
If you take your pack of troubles 
Always with you while you roam, 
You might better save your money, 
And your time, and stay at home. 

So just drop it in the ocean 
As you sight this summer port, 
And come smiling into harbor 
With a heart for any sport. 
Just forget the snows and blizzards, 
And the worries left behind, 
Meet the Eden of Jamaica, 
With an Eden of the mind. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 55 

INTERMEDIARY 

When from the prison of its body free, 
My soul shall soar, before it goes to Thee, 
Thou great Creator, give it power to know 
The language of all sad, dumb things below. 
And let me dwell a season still on earth 
Before I rise to some diviner birth: 
Invisible to men, yet seen and heard, 
And understood by sorrowing beast and bird — 
Invisible to men, yet always near, 
To whisper counsel in the human ear; 
And with a spell to stay the hunter's hand 
And stir his heart to know and understand; 
To plant within the dull or thoughtless mind 
The great religious impulse to be kind. 

Before I prune my spirit wings and rise 
To seek my loved ones in their paradise, 
Yea! even before I hasten on to see 
That lost child's face, so like a dream to me, 
I would be given this intermediate role, 
And carry comfort to each poor, dumb soul; 
And bridge man's gulf of cruelty and sin 
By understanding of his lower kin. 
'Twixt weary driver and the straining steed 
On wings of mercy would my spirit speed. 
And each should know, before his journey's end, 
That in the other dwelt a loving friend. 



56 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

From zoo and jungle, and from cage and stall, 
I would translate each inarticulate call, 
Each pleading look, each frenzied act and cry, 
And tell the story to each passer-by; 
And of a spirit's privilege possessed, 
Pursue Indifference to its couch of rest, 
And whisper in its ear until in awe 
It woke and knew God's all-embracing law 
Of Universal Life — the One in All. 

iJi ife 5fc ife rf» ife 2fc jftj 

Lord, let this mission to my lot befall. 

Among all my happy experiences on this 
Island nothing gave me more satisfaction than 
this event. It was not alone the privilege of 
helping the Society with funds, but the oppor- 
tunity to make people think on the subject of 
man's duty to the lesser creatures of earth. 

The cruelty in Jamaica is not of the fiendish, 
and inhuman type that characterizes the Latin 
and Oriental countries; it is not so brutal as that 
witnessed in Cuba. Jamaica cruelty is more a 
matter of ignorance and lack of thought, and is 
therefore more hopeful of being remedied by 
education. 

It should be the pleasure and pride of every 
American tourist to do some little act to help 
the societies for protection of animals wherever 
they go, and to encourage drivers in using mercy 
and kindness in their treatment of horses. 




Jamaica. 




Jamaica. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 57 

Americans are the greatest travelers of all 
nations. America and England do the best 
organized work in regard to the protection of 
animals of all the countries of earth. But how 
much more might be accomplished were every 
traveler to speak the needed word to drivers, 
and to help the humane fund in every land he 
visits by a small contribution. 

To teach the religion of kindness on earth 
is more important than to make converts to 
our own especial creed. Religion which per- 
mits cruelty to animals without protest, or 
the slaughter of beast and bird for "sport," 
can never evangelize the world. 

Our rooms at the new Titchfield faced the 
sea toward the north, with Folly Island and 
lighthouse a little to the right. 

The view from this side of the hotel is sur- 
passingly gorgeous in coloring. The hotel 
bungalows, embowered in tropical verdure, the 
lawns of vivid green decorated with rose trees, 
croton and bagonia bushes and shaded by 
royal palms, occupy the space of two city 
blocks between the Titchfield and the sea. 
When the sun shines (as it usually does) the 
sea for a space of 200 yards is a most intense 
green — more vivid than nile green; and then, 
as if cut off like so many yards of silk, and 
sewn to another strip of peacock blue — a nar- 



58 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

rower line of ardent blue water stretches be- 
fore the astonished eye; and just beyond that 
a wide strip of perfect amethyst reaches out 
to the duller depths of dark blue which meet 
the horizon. 

Different climatic changes occur and are 
observable in these waters, but they are al- 
ways (when the sun shines) remarkable in their 
variety. In the cottage almost under our 
window, this winter, lived Alexander Dowie, 
self proclaimed Elijah, then on the downward 
slope of his rocket-like career. 

He, the "healer" by spiritual power, of all 
disease, was lying dangerously ill, attended 
by nurses and physicians, of maladies which 
proved . fatal a few months later. 

His secretary and two nurses I saw daily, 
and sometimes spoke with them. They were 
of his followers and believers; and like most 
of his flock, were gentle, negative people, 
easily dominated by a positive mind. 

Alexander Dowie, despite his final self-in- 
duced fall, and the disintegration of his prov- 
ince, must stand always as one of the remark- 
able personalities of the age; a sort of abnormal 
and startling fungus growth on the face of 
modern religion. Ignorant, uncontrolled, and 
obscure, he yet created a mighty church, a 
great bank and an industrial city, which brought 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 59 

him a colossal fortune and gave him millions 
of followers, who believed he was "Elijah." 

And after all, may he not have been the re- 
incarnated Elijah, sent back to finish up the 
work he left suddenly in the hands of Elisha 
when he took his aeroplane ride in a whirlwind 
of fire? 

Elijah was a revengeful man despite his 
religious proclivities and his occult skill. He 
delighted in playing with fire, in astonishing 
his rivals and enemies by his necromancy, and 
in calling down curses on the heads of those 
who did not believe as he did. May he not 
have been forced by the laws he set in motion 
to come back and complete his earth life in 
the spectacular and ignoble manner which 
characterized the career of Alexander Dowie? 
I once heard Dowie preach. He rolled upon 
the stage of the great Auditorium hall in Chi- 
cago, a tub of a man, coarse, ill shaped, devoid 
of magnetism; his discourse was a harangue 
composed of platitudes; it was uttered in a 
harsh, jarring voice, and in a manner devoid of 
all earnestness or enthusiasm. A more unin- 
teresting personality for a great leader of men 
could not be imagined. Yet he brought with 
him into this earth incarnation some peculiar 
quality which permitted him to reign for a 
season, a monarch in his own domain, and to 



60 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

end in a whirlwind for the second time, perhaps— 
a whirlwind of his own uncontrolled tempers, 
tyrannies and "graftings." 

Looking down on his beautiful little bunga- 
low and hearing of the sumptuous manner in 
which he and his five attendants lived, I could 
but explain his prowess as the "left over" 
remnants of an earlier incarnation, in which he 
had accumulated power over material things. 

Every afternoon at four o'clock, from one of 
the bungalows below us we heard a sweet 
clear voice calling "Neenah." Over and over 
again this call came, sometimes followed by a 
merry laugh, and a call to "Papa" and only 
when the mewing of a cat and the inevitable 
hoarse croak were added, did we realize our 
neighbor was a parrot. 

Sometimes "Neenah" was hailed in the 
morning; but always was her name sent across 
the intervening space over the rose bushes and 
thro' the moving palms every afternoon at 
four. It grew to be a part of the place, the 
scene, the time, for us; and I fell asleep in my 
afternoon siesta or awoke from it to the musical 
sound of "Neenah," "Neenah." 

After we went away, it still haunted our 
memory and brought with it all the atmos- 
phere of beautiful Hotel Titchneld and Port 
Antonio. When we left Port Antonio we went 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 61 

to Bowden for a brief stay. Our ship, "The 
Admiral Schley, "left in the afternoon of March 
12th and stopped at various points to load 
bananas, reaching Bowden in the evening. A 
carriage waited and we drove up the mountain 
side to this lovely retreat, to find ourselves the 
sole occupants of a cozy bungalow, overlook- 
ing Anota Bay from one side, the sea from the 
other, from the third point of view the moun- 
tains at an altitude of 800 feet. , 

The evening was radiant with a spectacular 
sunset, and the night soft with a full moon. 
Winds sighed, and birds twittered, and the 
whole world seemed ours. We were Adam and 
Eve in a new corner of Paradise. The next 
night (after one full night and day spent in this 
bewitching retreat) we drove down the mountain 
side at three in the morning to take our boat, 
which had made a detour in gathering bananas, 
and had come back to Bowden for us. 

It almost seemed that we were astral bodies 
floating through space in a silver world of en- 
trancing beauty, as we made our descent of the 
mountain at that eerie hour of night. 

As we stood on the deck and watched the 
large row boats brought in, and the bananas 
unloaded," to the curious sing song of a native 
refrain, by hundreds of colored men and women, 
the kindly illusion of moonlight made the final 



62 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

scene one of picturesque interest to carry away 
with us to the gray March world, whither our 
boat was headed. 

Deep in our hearts, we carried too, a hope of 
some day returning to Bowden with a little 
circle of congenial friends; six, or possibly eight 
people, who would take possession of the Bowden 
bungalows, and live a pastoral and peaceful life 
there together, for two weeks, or a month. 
Nothing more delightful could be imagined than 
such an experience with the right selection of 
friends. We had the circle mentally complete, 
and each year we have talked it over with these 
friends as a pleasure to be planned for and en- 
joyed in the future. 

Of these friends, no one was more interested 
and eager to see the dream come true than 
"Martha," whose beautiful girlhood we had 
watched bloom into happy wifehood. 

But in the splendor of an incomparable May 
day of this year, Martha, in the fullness of her 
beauty and in the richness of her love life, went 
to journey in lands bright with a light which 
never was on land or sea. 

And so the little dream of a happy holiday in 
Bowden with congenial friends will never be 
realized. 

After we had left the warm zone behind us, 
and had begun to drag our heavy wraps from 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 63 

our steamer trunk, and to shiver on our deck 
promenade, we set to wondering why we had left 
adorable Jamaica so soon. 

Why did we not wait two weeks, or another 
month? 

The question recurred with irritating force, 
when we landed at Boston in the heaviest bliz- 
zard of the winter — a mad mid-March snow 
storm. 

"Why, why, why did we come away so soon?" 
we asked each other. A long distance telephone 
message brought the answer on the following 
day. My aged mother had a sudden stroke of 
paralysis and was dying. 

We reached her the next day forty- eight 
hours before she gained her longed for release from 
the bondage of old age, and passed into blessed 
spiritual freedom. 

That was why, unconsciously, and under 
guidance of Invisible Helpers, we had been 
moved to leave Jamaica so soon. 



64 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



HONOLULU 

"You will not like Honolulu," they said. 
"They," the wise ones. "You will find it so 
modernized and spoiled by the Americans. 
Why not go to Tahiti?" 

It was Tahiti we desired to see; but the voyage 
was just double in length, and the boat half in 
size, and we were not sure that comfortable 
accommodations would await us there, on arrival. 

It is all very well when one is twenty, to set 
forth on large seas in small boats for difficult 
and barbaric goals, provided only with a flask 
of water, and a box of crackers. 

But there comes a time in life, when, however 
we love travel and new experiences, and even 
adventure, we demand decent beds, and di- 
gestible food, at certain hours of the day. We 
had reached that time of life, and so we set sail 
on a great ocean Ark, plying between San 
Francisco and the Orient, and which rode the 
billows as quietly as a row boat floats on a small 
pond. 

And our destination was made in six days, and 
our goal was Honolulu. It was late January, 
and we were seeking another summer land, after 
having wandered far and away, into foreign 
regions, the year before, searching for a winter 











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Honolulu. — A Famous Hula Dancer. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 65 

resort as beautiful as Jamaica, and failing to 
find it. 

We had reveled in the historic charms of 
Southern France and Italy; but we had shivered 
while we reveled. We had dreamed among the 
ruins of old Greek Theatres in Syracuse, and 
Taormina, Sicily, but we had felt the cold winds 
from the Alps while we dreamed; we had feasted 
on the wonders of old Rome, Pompeii and 
Herculaneum, and felt ourselves a part of these 
lost worlds, and almost as cold as the dead who 
slept in crypt and catacomb. 

It was, to be sure, a winter of unusual severity, 
and no doubt other travelers have found the 
Riviera as beautiful in climate as it is in scenery 
and situation; but we were disappointed in its 
temperature, and we carried away with us to 
Egypt memories of expensive rooms pervaded 
by damp chills, and superb drives made uncom- 
fortable by Alpine winds, as well as a trunk 
full of summer garments which had served no 
purpose save to add francs and lires galore to 
Italy's outrageous excess baggage charge. 

Even Egypt, the wonderful and incomparable, 
the mysterious and profound, the longed for and 
attained, Egypt — gave us a cool greeting. 

"If we do not wear our ducks and linens in 
Egypt," Himself said the morning we were 
getting our baggage ready to be sent ashore at 



66 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Alexandria, "I shall feel tempted to chuck the 
trunks containing them into the sea." Oh, 
we will surely need them here," I said. But the 
very first familiar object we saw, the morning 
of our arrival in Cairo, was an English woman 
sitting on the hotel veranda wearing a fur boa! 

Nevertheless we did use our linens a few hours 
in midday while there; between eleven and three 
they were possible; while mornings and evenings 
heavier garments were needed. And despite 
the charm, the glory and fascination which 
Egypt held for us, our two salamander souls at 
times sighed for the climate of Jamaica! 

"Not yet," we said, "have we found any other 
place where nature has provided such splendor 
for the eye, and such perfection of climate — 
for winter months, as that gem of the West 
Indian Islands offers to travelers." 

And now we were sailing in search of a new 
experience in the Hawaiian Islands. 

Approaching Honolulu from the harbor our 
first emotion was one of disappointment. The 
surrounding mountains were bare and bleak, 
and unimpressive despite the savage majesty 
of Diamond Head, and there was nothing to 
remind us of the tropical splendor of Jamaica, 
in the perspective. 

Then our first half day in a palatial, comfort- 
able, but purely commercial hotel, on a busy 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 67 

city street, which looked out on other busy streets, 
broke the back of our illusions, and the heart 
of our dreams. "We might as well be in Spring- 
field, Mass., or Hartford, Conn.," Himself mut- 
tered with a despondent face, as he looked out of 
our window at the top of roofs and chimneys, 
"for all there is tropical in this scene." 

"Only there we would be ringing up the office, 
asking for more heat, and here I am hunting 
for a fan," I said. 

But despite the state of the thermometer, my 
spirits were running down to zero. A light rain 
had begun to fall, and while waiting the arrival 
of our trunks, we decided to sally forth under 
umbrellas and see something of the town. 

We had proceeded hardly two squares when 
our eyes suddenly beheld a most tropical picture; 
back from the street in a palm filled enclosure, 
stood a rambling structure, surrounded by tiny 
bungalows, hidden under purple Bongenvillia 
vines, and behind great leaved Elephantgas 
plants. 

It was the old Hawaiian Hotel, closed since 
the completion of the new commercial edifice. 

Walking along the shaded winding road that 
led into this enclosure, we suddenly felt all the 
atmospheric charm of the tropics enfolding us 
like tender arms; and just then the rain ceased 
and the sun came out, and all was well with the 



68 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

world, with Honolulu and with us. Our dis- 
appointments and troubles were over; in an 
hour's time we had rented the very smallest and 
daintiest bungalow on earth, three cozy rooms 
containing seven windows and four doors, and 
looking out on growing green things, the most 
delightful nest of a place two wanderers in 
search of rest and quiet could desire. 

The next morning we were installed there, 
bag and baggage, "kits, cats, sacs and wives." 
Literally cats, for with our usual luck, a friendly 
cat came to us within a few hours after we were 
located. I made her welcome, and provided 
a box on the portico for her evidently approach- 
ing need of comfortable lying-in quarters. But 
not until three days elapsed did she call again, 
this time to "break bread" with us; and only at 
the expiration of a week were we able (by the 
assistance of spies set upon Madam Puss), to 
find her family of six kittens, in the linen room 
of the dismantled old hotel. Brought down, 
and snugly ensconced on our portico, in a quiet 
corner, they were allowed to remain only four or 
five days. Then the mother cat carried them 
back to the empty linen room, up two nights of 
stairs. Finding she was determined on this 
step, I assisted her in the transportation of the 
last half of her family, and every day thereafter 
she called upon us three times. Once at eight 



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Honolulu. — Peacocks at Gov. Cleghorn's Place. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 69 

o'clock for breakfast; at five o'clock for dinner; 
and again a little later she made a dinner call — 
rolling on the floor and purring violently to 
express her thanks for our courtesies. Like the 
cats of Moneague, she reveled in a varied diet 
of fish, fowl, meat and cream, while we remained 
her hosts; and each one of her offspring was 
bespoken before our day of departure. 

Our "drawing room" in the little bungalow 
served also as a study and a smoking room. A 
deep bay window curtained by lace draperies 
gave Himself a comfortable nook for a table and 
big chair, with a beautiful outlook on flowering 
trees and emerald lawns. The center of the 
room was "my study." It consisted of a table 
set between two doors which gave me always 
a fresh current of air, and it was lighted in the 
evening by a chandelier directly above it. 
"Ah-Lui," a Chinese youth, the personification 
of simplicity and optimism, kept our rooms in 
order, and "Meekie," a doll-sized Japanese girl 
came clattering in her wooden shoes every after- 
noon at four, to act in the capacity of visiting 
maid. Such a free happy life as it proved to be, 
so full of new pleasures and interests. The 
nights were cooler than the nights of Jamaica, 
and stimulated one to more activity. I woke in 
the morning filled with ambition, and between 
breakfast and the arrival of "Meekie" who 



70 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

usually attired me for some social function in 
this most hospitable town, I wrote many bits 
of verse, and prose while Himself smoked his 
cigar and read his book in the alcove. 

Thinking one day of the many transient 
places which He and I had found veritable 
Edens of enjoyment a little poem took form 
under the caption: 

MY HEAVEN 

Unhoused in deserts of accepted thought, 
And lost in jungles of confusing creeds, 
My soul strayed, homeless, finding its own 
needs 

Unsatisfied with what tradition taught. 

The pros and cons, the little ifs and ands, 
The but and maybe, and the this and that, 
On which the churches thicken and grow fat, 

I found but structures built on shifting sands. 

And all their heavens were strange and far away, 
And all their hells were made of human hate; 
And since for death I did not care to wait, 

A heaven I fashioned for myself one day. 

Of happy thoughts I built it stone by stone, 
With joy of life I draped each spacious room, 
With love's great light I drove away all gloom, 

And in the center I made God a throne. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 71 

And this dear heaven I set within my heart, 
And carried it about with me alway, 
And then the changing dogmas of the day 

Seemed alien to my thoughts and held no part. 

Now as I take my heaven from place to place 
I find new rooms by love's revealing light, 
And death will give me but a larger sight 

To see my palace spreading into space. 

However spoiled by American influences Hono- 
lulu might seem to the old residents, accustomed 
to the local color of the monarchial days, under 
King Kalakua, or Queen Liliuokalani, to us it 
proved fascinating in the extreme, and the days 
were full of novelty. 

The very first night at dinner in Young's 
Hotel (all our meals were taken in this excellent 
restaurant) we were treated to the novel ex- 
perience of seeing white men in evening dress, 
seated at tables with beautifully gowned and 
resplendently jeweled women, whose bare shoul- 
ders, arms and glowing faces were as brown and 
smooth as old oak; women with luxurious 
heads of straight black hair, with handsomely 
moulded features and beautifully shaped hands 
and feet. Sometimes there were children (half 
breeds of assorted colors) with these men and 
women — and almost always were they of striking 
beauty. 



73 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

At first we felt a curious sensation of surprise, 
that was not altogether agreeable, at this spec- 
tacle of amalgamation of races; but in a brief 
time it passed, and we grew into the acceptance 
of the fact that the color problem in Hawaii, 
which has to deal with Polynesians, Japanese 
and Chinese, is quite a separate condition from 
that which is faced in the States or the West 
Indies. 

Among the pleasures which the following days 
gave us were trolley rides to the bathing beach 
at Waikiki, a trip of half an hour through 
sumptuous scenery, and past artistic residences; 
and at the beach there was an exciting experience 
of surf riding in native canoes. Guided by 
stalwart Polynesian oarsmen, we went far out to 
meet the incoming billows, and then raced in 
upon their crests — often with a seeming perilous 
celerity, and always saturated with the salt spray. 

There were beauty discovering drives, cul- 
minating in a tallyho ascent of the famous Pali, 
commanding one of the most majestic views of 
the world; the historic Pali over which King 
Kamehameha I. drove his enemies, and gained 
the victory which united the islands under one 
government. There was a moonlight motor ride 
around Diamond Head, an experience to re- 
member always; and there was a railroad journey 
out to Nakiana along the coast which revealed 




Honolulu. — Our Bungalow. Meekie, Jap Maid. 



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Honolulu. — Diving Boys Presenting Lais. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 73 

a panorama of miles of rainbow hued surf, 
breaking in mountain billows on the shore, a 
sight unlike anything we had yet beheld. 

Then one day we were invited to a "Luau," 
a native feast. Now the hostess of this feast 
was known as "Princess Therese," but her self- 
bestowed title interested me less than her legally 
obtained name of Mrs. Robert Wilcox, which 
name belongs by law, and love, to me also. 

For many years Himself and I had been in- 
terested in the spectacular career of his "name- 
sake," the Hawaiian Robert Wilcox now de- 
ceased. A half English Polynesian, he had been 
selected by the late King as one of three promis- 
ing youths to receive a foreign education, and to 
reflect glory on the rising generation of Hawai- 
ians forever after. Mr. Wilcox was exceedingly 
handsome and brilliant, but he lacked discretion 
in love and war. Representing himself as a 
Prince, he espoused an Italian lady of title, who 
straightway divorced him when she reached 
Honolulu and learned the facts. 

Later he became an active Royal-Revolution- 
ist, and was often arrested and imprisoned, and 
once barely escaped the death penalty for of- 
fenses against the new government. Although 
disliked and regarded as an upstart by the 
Queen, Mr. Wilcox was worshiped by the people 
of Hawaii. - He was sent to represent the Island 



74 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

of Oahu, to Washington, D. C, and died with a 
halo, visible only to Polynesian eyes, about his 
handsome head. 

This "Luau," to which we were bidden, was 
given as a birthday party in his memory by his 
widow "Princess Therese," his second wife, a 
comely, well-preserved native woman of middle 
age. 

We arrived a little late, and found fifty full 
blooded or half white guests seated at four 
tables. Our places were waiting, with our long 
wreaths of yellow flowers, the "Royal leis," 
together with another wreath of green leaves. 
Every guest wore these wreaths about hat, and 
neck, and the room was redolent with their odor. 

The women were all attired in the freshly 
starched loose flowing native dress, known as 
the Holoku, which is merely a "Mother Hub- 
bard" of reduced proportions, and the men 
were conventional in American summer outing 
garments. 

Interest in our presence at the feast was greatly 
augmented by the discovery that Himself bore 
the same name of their beloved hero, whose, 
birthday was being commemorated. 

Now at this feast at which we were seated 
there was not a knife, spoon or fork visible, and 
the contents of each of the many wonderful 
and awful dishes set before us, had to be con- 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 75 

veyed to the mouth by those oldest of table 
implements — the fingers. A large finger bowl 
(or wash basin) was passed first to prepare the 
fingers to serve as forks, and then by glancing 
at our neighbors, we learned the method of 
procedure and set to work. At least I did. 
Determined to do as the Romans did while at 
Rome, I dipped my fingers into every dish and 
sampled it, but Himself left the table little wiser 
than he sat down, having eaten nothing but fruit. 

Even the Poi I managed to convey to my 
mouth without disaster, but I must confess that 
I was relieved when the feast was over and we 
adjourned to the ballroom. There we were 
given an abbreviated and modified exhibition 
of the native dance, the Hula (pronounced hoola) 
by two handsome women of over generous pro- 
portions, who in the heyday of youth had 
"danced before the King," even as Salome of old. 

The Hula, as performed in the halcyon days of 
Honolulu, in a skirt of grass, when Rum and 
Royalty reigned, and annexation was an un- 
known word (like sobriety), is forbidden by 
law to-day. But we saw it later, given in ballet 
costume by the ugliest old dame in the eight 
Islands, and her exquisitely beautiful niece of 14. 
The large bodied, perspiring father or uncle of 
the child, attired in a man's shirt and a woman's 
skirt, came in at the finish of the dance, with 



76 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

much abdominal obtrusiveness. The arm move- 
ments of the Hula are graceful and alluring, 
and they relate certain historic events when 
translated by the initiated. The leg movements 
are rhythmic and fascinating, but the abdominal 
contortions and muscle writhings are disgusting, 
and almost, if not quite, obscenely vulgar. 

It was a promising commentary on the de- 
velopment of the Hawaiian toward highei ideals 
of womanhood, to note the unmistakable shrink- 
ing of the little 14-year girl from the performance 
of the task allotted her, in the Hula dance. The 
child had the beauty of a bronze Madonna, and 
innocence and modesty were expressed in her 
sweet countenance too clearly to be assumed. 

She seemed to sense, rather than to know, that 
the dance was immodest, and she finished her 
encore without once lifting her eyes from the 
floor to the face of the dozen spectators. How 
different from the old days when King Kalakaua 
kept his ballet of Hula dancers, and every girl 
not of royal blood on the eight Islands was proud 
to display her body in the national dance to 
greedy, curious and unholy eyes, at festivals 
which ended in orgies. Perhaps Honolulu is a 
little duller than it was then, but it certainly 
possesses a larger percentage of self respecting 
women and uninebriated men. 

Early in our stay in Honolulu we discovered a 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 77 

native fruit exactly like the "Paw paw" of 
Jamaica which grows on a tree, but in Honolulu 
it is mothered by a shrub and is called the Papia. 

This fruit is most delicious, combining the 
taste of the canteloupe and the banana, with an 
added flavor of its own. 

Every night Himself purchased a Papia from 
the Chinese fruit vender on the corner, and every 
morning we enjoyed a cozy ante breakfast feast 
in our bungalow, before walking over to our 
almost mid-day meal at the hotel. 

Between our cottage and the hotel a tall tree 
cast its drooping branches over the pavement, 
just in front of a physician's office. One morn- 
ing we observed that this tree had bloomed into 
remarkable beauty during the night. Large 
bell-shaped flowers of pure white and with a 
subtle permeating fragrance were hanging from 
every bough. I plucked one and sniffed its per- 
fume and admired its beauty as I walked along, 
and after I sat at the table waiting for breakfast 
to be brought. I had awakened that morning 
in excellent appetite and had surprised Himself 
by my generous order to our waiter. 

But suddenly I felt an overwhelming weari- 
ness; I did not want any food; I wanted to go 
back to the bungalow and lie down. Over- 
coming this indisposition by an effort, I man- 
aged to drink my coffee and to taste a little 



78 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

food. Feeling unutterably weary and with 
the beautiful flower still in my hand, I stopped 
at the hotel office to ask its name, and then I 
learned the secret of my sudden indisposition. 
"I do not know the botanical name" my in- 
formant replied, "but it is called the sleeping 
flower, because its perfume induces sleep. To 
taste it is death. Two children died last month 
over in the volcano region from chewing the 
petals of this flower. A bouquet in a room will 
produce an effect like a narcotic, and were one 
to lie down under the tree which bears this 
flower, a deep sleep would fall upon him." 

How very like a certain type of beautiful 
woman, fair and fragrant and alluring, but 
bringing inertia and death if known too well. 

One of the curious old customs in Hawaii is 
the presentation of a newly born or very }^oung 
child to a near friend or relative. This present 
is regarded as a solemn trust. It originated in 
the early days when Hawaii was occupied by 
various tribes, and was intended as a peace 
offering. A child brought up by one tribe, 
knew his origin; and this insured his peaceful 
proclivities toward his blood relatives. When 
difficulties arose, some other method than war 
would be resorted to for the adjustment of 
these differences. 

The custom of child giving continues to this day. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 79 

Only recently the Prince and Princess Kawa- 
nanakoa gave one of their children to the mother 
of the Princess, Mrs. Samuel Parker; and it 
became legally the sister of its mother in con- 
sequence. 

In Honolulu, we heard no word of "hard times." 
No one talked of trusts, monopolies, failures or 
panics. 

No beggars were seen on the streets, and no 
"unemployed" sat about darkening the sun 
with unhappy faces. 

The flower sellers, a picturesque class of 
natives, squatted at street corners and waited at 
boats and trains to supply tourists with their 
lovely "leis." But they never importuned. 
There is a dignity about the Hawaiian which 
prevents him from degenerating into a beggar. 
These flower venders have wreaths to sell; they 
are merchants; if you want the flowers, they are 
yours; if you decline, they would no more think 
of pestering you than would the New York 
merchant, if you passed his wares by. 

Remembering Southern Italy, and Cairo and 
Constantinople, where life was made miserable 
by the persevering and persistnt merchants of all 
kinds of salable things, and before whom we 
were obliged to flee as from a simoon, Honolulu 
seemed indeed worthy of its name, The Paradise 
of the Pacific. 



80 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



THE MEANING OF SUNDAY 

It was a Sunday morning. Himself and I 
were sitting in an exquisite little cottage — our 
make-believe house — in a tropical Hawaiian 
garden. 

Wild birds, with strange, wonderful notes of 
joy in their voices, were singing, "Glory to God 
in the Highest." 

Palm trees were waving graceful arms, as if in 
religious ecstasy. 

The month was February. The weather July. 
A handsome Hawaiian maiden walked by, 
dressed in her freshly starched "holoku," and 
carrying her tall body with native dignity. A 
tiny Japanese girl trotted near, wearing her 
kimono as only a native Japanese woman can 
wear it. 

A Chinese mother paused in front of our cot- 
tage to strap the crimson silk blanket more 
snugly about the baby on her back. She wore a 
peacock blue coat, and a queer gold pin fastened 
her black hair. 

Everything was picturesque, artistic and 
fascinating to the eye and ear. 

Life was full of color, light, romance, beauty. 
God seemed near — and the world was good. 




HONOLULU.— QUEEN LILIUOKALANI. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 81 

Then suddenly a sound! The bird's songs, 
the rustle of palm leaves, the breathings of 
Nature, were drowned under a mournful wail. 

A chorus of voices, accompanied by a melan- 
choly organ, sent forth the dismal New England 
hymns from the Christian Mission Church 
across the way from our little bungalow. Verse 
after verse, hymn after hymn, bruised the bright 
air into dark despondency. Joy changed to 
melancholy; happiness in the present gave way 
to sad memories ! Funeral services in the country 
church of my childhood rose before me; I heard 
the drone of the clergyman's voice, the sob of 
the mourners; and all the joy of life was lost, 
and God was far away. 

Himself looked at me with grave eyes. 

"It is awful, isn't it?" he said. "I am back 
in a New England town — an orphan boy — 
living next door to the church with my grand- 
mother. It is a cold, rainy Winter day, but I 
live so near, I cannot escape the long service, 
and the fear inspiring sermon. If I play sick 
and stay at home I still hear the mournful 
hymns, and threats of death, and the grave and 
hell fire which await boys who play sick. 
What a pity our Christian ancestors adopted 
such music and such hymns to represent the 
love-one-another creed of Christ!" 

"I wish we were in a Hawaiian jungle," I 

6 



82 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

said, "alone with Nature, and Nature's God." 
"So do I," said Himself. 

Then we heard the congregation leaving the 
church and knew the service was over. I am 
sure the prayer of gratitude from our hearts 
was as sincere as any prayer that went up to 
heaven that morning. 

For we could worship again through the happy 
sounds of singing birds and rustling leaves. A 
little later a band of Hawaiian singers broke 
forth in song. There was the joy of life, the 
ring of youth, the throb of hope, the thrill of 
passion in their voices. The echoes took up the 
strain and repeated it — the world seemed bright- 
er, and life more vital as they sang. The sun 
was in their song; and there was the scent of 
flowers,, and the pulse of Nature in the strain. 

"I would rather be welcomed in heaven by 
music like that," I said, "than by those orthodox 
hymns." 

And "Himself" nodded approval. "Give me 
any kind of a heaven — or no heaven at all," 
he said, "rather than a place that reminds me of 
my boyhood Sundays." 

Coming across the Pacific to Honolulu the 
passenger list of 200 people contained forty- 
one missionaries, en route to foreign lands. 
One Sunday morning a little child of three came 
laughing gayly into the ship's writing room. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 83 

Her voice sounded like a trill of a happy bird 
and I turned to look at the child, just as her 
father, a young missionary, called to her sternly, 
"Hush — don't you know that this is Sunday? 
You must not laugh like that." 

It was not my business, of course, but I 
could not remain silent. "Please let your baby 
laugh on Sunday," I said. "Surely God can- 
not be displeased. And do not let her grow up 
with a dread of Sunday as a day of gloom." 

"I do not wish my child to consider Sunday 
a holiday," the young missionary replied, 
coldly. "But," I pleaded, "you give her a 
wrong impression of God. The best man I 
know — a man of a real religious nature — had 
to battle with himself for years to overcome a 
dread of the life after death, just because he 
feared heaven would be like the Sunday of his 
New England childhood. He really felt hell 
fire would be more cheerful." 

"God's day is dear to those who love Him," 
said the missionary, and he turned his back 
upon me. 

The laughing baby tiptoed out of the room, 
with trouble in her young eyes. 

In the Honolulu Advertiser recently there 
appeared in the "Bystanders" column an in- 
teresting paragraph speaking of the various 
classes of society in Honolulu. It said: 



84 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

"Then there is the conservative missionary 
society. I saw it gather at a golden wedding 
years ago, and the scene carried me back to old 
New England days . This society dressed soberly, 
the women bringing out a little old lace, per- 
haps, heirloom brooches with white cut cameos 
on yellow ground and the like, and showing a 
penchant for layer cake, tea and tatting. It 
was a society without veneer, with an interest 
in serious things, with a Puritan dislike of frills 
and furbelows and without much fun. That 
petrified intolerance known as the New England 
conscience ran through it all; and it seemed to 
me, as I mingled with the grave assemblage 
that it always kept the end of the passage in 
view. The feast and the skeleton were never 
separated." 

That is just the way it seems to me; in their 
church hymns one always feels the funereal 
element; and with their "petrified intolerance" 
they destroy the very essence of life — which is 
love. 

I have so long lived away and apart from 
this type of Christian that I had grown to think 
the species extinct. Dwelling among "New 
Thought" and "Theosophical" and "Great 
School" people, who believe in joy as an ele- 
ment of religion, I had forgotten much of the 
horror of the old creeds; and so it all came 
upon me again with a shock of surprise. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 85 

I would sooner go begging my bread from 
door to door, homeless, friendless, persecuted 
and despised by men, than give up my belief 
in immortal life, in a God of Love and Light, 
in the ministering of angels, the guidance of 
invisible helpers. 

I know I am an immortal soul; I know 
I have always lived, and will always live, 
passing on from sphere to sphere, from cycle 
to cycle — pausing at great periods of time to 
"contemplate" God in Nirvana — and yet again 
going forth as His expression. And this faith, 
this knowledge, fills me full of joy. 

Life is so great a privilege, its opportuni- 
ties for usefulness, for happiness, for achieve- 
ment, for pleasure, so immense that there is 
ever a song in my heart. 

Perhaps, because I wake always with this 
song of gratitude in my soul I do not find it 
necessary to make Sunday a particular day 
of praise giving. At all events I dare to laugh 
and be glad on Sunday, and since all days are 
holy days to me, so Sunday is holy. It is good 
to rest from hard labor on that day, good for 
man and beasts and' it is good to contemplate 
the higher purposes of existence, apart from 
the wage earning, money getting, and purely 
material phases of life. 

But it is not good to make the day one of 



86 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

funereal gloom, of dull melancholy, of dismal 
psalm singing. 

It is not good to tell a little child to hush 
its laughter, and it is not good to compel 
young people or people who labor early and 
late six days of the week to relinquish the 
innocent sports, games and relaxations of life. 

God is Light! God is Love! Life is a privi- 
lege. 

Rejoice, oh, my soul, and be glad! Sing, 
dance, laugh and give praise; not one day 
of the seven, but seven days of the seven. 

Glory to God in the highest! 



THE PASSING OF A PRINCESS 

There, is one name which, when spoken in 
Honolulu, or, indeed, in any part of the Ha- 
waiian Islands, brings a tender look to every 
face, a look which is like the reverent lifting 
of a hat. That name is Kaiulani. 

Born to wealth and station, reared with 
every advantage, beautiful and beloved, Prin- 
cess Kaiulani passed early to the royal mau- 
soleum to sleep with her ancestors. 

I walked one day in wide spreading grounds, 
under the shadow of lordly palms, where her 
childhood was spent. Tropical vines, flower- 
ing in audacious colors, flung bold arms about 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 87 

unresisting trees and made a riot of strange 
bloom. 

Splendid peacocks swept down the spacious 
paths, beside the handsome white-haired host, 
as he came to greet his guests. Soft fountains 
played and refreshed the air with cooling 
sounds. The month was February, the weath- 
er July. 

We sat under a wonderful banyan tree, 
made historic by the pen of Robert Louis 
Stevenson. 

Later we sipped tea in a great room filled 
with portraits of kings, queens, princes and 
princesses, rulers and potentates, all interest- 
ing from a historical point of view, but one, 
oft repeated, from -^childhood to young woman- 
hood, was of peculiar and pathetic interest. 

Kaiulani, daughter of our stately host, Gov- 
ernor Cleghorn, and his wife, Likelike, sister 
to the late king. 

Kaiulani was heir apparent to the throne of 
Hawaii, and she had grown from childhood to 
young womanhood, thinking of herself as a 
future queen. 

Governor Cleghorn had made his magnifi- 
cent estate what he deemed a suitable home 
for a coming queen, and he had sent Kaiulani 
to Scotland and England and France to edu- 
cate her as befitted her position. While she 



88 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

was abroad the great change came to the 
Hawaiian Islands, which turned them from a 
kingdom to a territory of the United States. 

Kaiulani was only a young girl; she was not 
a philosopher or a deep student of altruistic 
forms of government, and so the blow fell upon 
her with severity; it destroyed her dearest 
hope, her most cherished ambition, and one 
year after annexation she died. 

Everybody in Honolulu and in the Ha- 
waiian Islands loved ' ' Princess Kaiulani. ' ' When 
she went away to Scotland to attend school 
Robert Louis Stevenson wrote in her album: 

"Forth from her land to mine she goes, 
The Island maid, the Island rose. 
Light of heart and bright of face, 
The daughter of a double race. 
Her islands here in Southern sun 
Shall mourn their Kaiulani gone; 
And I, in her dear banyan shade, 
Look vainly for my little maid. 
But our Scots Island, far away, 
Shall glitter with unwonted day: 
And cast for once their tempests by, 
To smile in Kaiulani's eye." 

And to these pretty lines, Mr. Stevenson 
appended this exquisite bit of prose, more po- 
etical than his poetry, as always was his prose: 




Honolulu.— Type of Native Beauty. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 89 

"Written in April to Kaiulani, in the April 
of her age, and at Waikiki, within easy walks 
of Kaiulani's Banyan. When she comes to my 
land and her fathers, and the rain beats upon 
the window (as I fear it will), let her look at 
this page- — it will be like a weed, gathered and 
pressed at home, and she will remember her 
islands and the shadow of the mighty tree, and 
she will hear the peacock's screaming in the 
dusk and the wind blowing in the palms, and 
she will think of her father sitting there alone." 

That was written in 1889 — and the father of 
Kaiulani still sits there alone. 

As we walked under the great banyan tree 
and down the avenues bordered by wonderful 
palms, and every specie of tree and vine and 
flowering shrub known in the tropics, Governor 
Cleghorn said softly: "I selected all these trees 
and arranged these grounds for Kaiulani. I 
wanted the domain to be a rest home for her, 
and these walks to give her cool shade in her 
promenades." 

But only visitors walk now where Kaiulani's 
slender feet trod for a few brief years. 

"She died of rheumatism of the heart," her 
father said, "a year after the annexation of Ha- 
waii. You see, she had been educated with 
the idea and expectation of becoming Queen. 
She was the nearest in line and had been offi- 



90 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

cially announced heir apparent. It was hard 
for all Hawaiians to accept the passing of the 
monarchy, even those who realized that it was 
inevitable and for the best. It was particu- 
larly hard for Kaiulani, who had been reared 
with the expectation of becoming our Queen. 

"It might really be said that she died of 
annexation. Her interest in life passed with 
the monarchy." 

Everywhere were portraits of Kaiulani. She 
was beautiful, as are almost all these "daugh- 
ters of a double race." 

The Polynesian blood, mingled with that of 
the English, Scotch, American or Irish, pro- 
duces a peculiarly attractive type of beauty, and 
education and culture had added their refining 
charm to the young Princess. 

As we walked down the long avenues and out 
to the main thoroughfare, followed by the 
haughty peacocks, who seemed to want con- 
vincing proof that we were not loitering in the 
grounds, a penetrating melancholy permeated 
the sunshine of the brilliant day, and never 
did life speak more clearly of the transitory 
nature of happiness which is based on human 
ambitions. 

Later in the day we stood by the royal mau- 
soleum, where Princess Kaiulani lies buried be- 
side her mother and her uncle, the late King 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 91 

of the Hawaiian Islands, and other members of 
the royal family, and again the words of the 
old Persian poet came to mind: 
"And this, too, shall pass away." 
Yet somewhere, I am sure, the sweet spirit 
of Kaiulani has realized its dream and some- 
where she is ascending thrones. For to each 
of us, in God's good time, must be given our 
heart's desire. 



KAIULANI 
Dreaming of thrones, she grew from child to 

maid, 
While under royal palms soft fountains played; 
She saw herself in Time's appointed hour 
Ruling her kingdom by love's potent power, 
Her radiant youth imperially arrayed. 
Where tropic suns were tempered by sweet 

shade, 
Protecting love, her pleasant pathway laid, 
And there she dwelt, a Princess in her bower, 

Dreaming of thrones. 
Marauding changes brutally invade 
Her island home; and yet Time's hand is stayed. 
Her name has left the fragrance of a flower, 
And in the regal state that was her dower 
She sleeps in beauteous youth that cannot fade, 

Dreaming of thrones. 



93 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



THE COLOR LINE IN HONOLULU 

The average high school graduate in America, 
if asked to describe the difference between 
brown skinned and black skinned races, would 
be unable to draw any distinction. 

They would all come under one term "colored 
people." 

But in Honolulu one quickly grows to realize 
how great is the distinction between the Poly- 
nesian and the African. When there is a possi- 
bility of being believed, the man or woman 
possessing negro blood denies it; but the man 
or woman of Polynesian blood, boasts of it. 

Perhaps the significant fact can be traced to 
the cruelty of the white man who first enslaved 
the African* and for centuries made him a beast 
of burden. The Polynesians have never been 
slaves. They have been savage, but they have 
ruled in their savagery. The ex-Queen Liliuo- 
kalani lived in the handsome residence, which 
had been her early home, just a moment's walk 
from our little bungalow. Through Governor 
Cleghorn we were given audience with her one 
morning. The native maid met us at the open 
door and conducted us down the hall to the 
bright reception room, where the stately dame 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 93 

sat awaiting us. A little maid of honor, pretty- 
as a bronze statuette, stood behind her chair; 
and in a retiring room the older servitors were 
in attendance. 

The Queen was attired in a royal blue silk 
holiku with neck and sleeves of native made 
lace. She was much handsomer than her pic- 
tures indicate, and although across the border 
line of seventy, she appeared little more than 
fifty. 

She talked interestingly of the days of the 
monarchy, of her experiences in travel, when 
she was entertained by all the rulers of the 
world, and related incidents of historical value. 
She graciously permitted me to look at the 
lines of her very beautiful hands (wherein I 
saw the whole story of her turbulent life), and 
asked me to autograph one of my books, which 
I had presented her through Governor Cleg- 
horn. She showed us the Royal Kahilis — 
curious ornaments resembling long feather dus- 
ters made of rare feathers of native birds 
now extinct. These ornaments stood beside 
the Queen's chair, and had been used in the 
Throne room (Himself had been eyeing them 
longingly, thinking what delightful souvenirs of 
Hawaii they would be for our collection). 

Then we made our bows and left the lonely 
woman to her reveries. A childless widow, 



94 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

with old age in the foreground, and all her glory 
and power and wealth in a rapidly receding 
past, she seemed a pathetic figure in our newly 
annexed territorial domain. But with the pa- 
thos was dignity, and a certain poise which 
prevented sympathy from becoming pity. 

Next in interest, as types of the upper class 
Polynesians, were Prince and Princess Kawan- 
anakoa. The Prince (recently deceased) was in 
reality not a prince of the blood; he was created 
a Prince by the King, whose consort was the 
young man's aunt. A handsome cultured young 
man, scarcely thirty, he had always been a 
child of fortune, and his deportment was that 
of the cultured cosmopolitan. Early in his 
twenties he married an extremely beautiful 
young heiress, a half Scotch girl, whose mother 
was a full blooded Hawaiian belle, and whose 
father was Col. Campbell, many times a million- 
aire. 

Close your eyes and let your imagination run 
riot, as to your ideal of a Hawaiian Princess, 
and you can picture no more beautiful and 
royal young creature than Princess Kawanan- 
akoa was when I met her. She came into the 
box at a theatre party given for us by a hos- 
pitable resident of Honolulu, and she seemed 
to radiate life, light, joy, youth and splendor. 
She had been married six years and was the 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 95 

mother of three children, yet she was only 23. 
Before her education was completed in the 
States, she met the young Prince during a visit 
home, and the immediate romance culminated 
in marriage when she was scarcely seventeen. 
Both inheriting large wealth, both occupying an 
exalted position on their Island, both beautiful 
with first youth and opulent personal charms, 
they lived a fairy-book life for the first few years 
after their marriage. At the time of my visit 
there was a cloud on their horizon. Money 
losses had come to the Prince, and his health 
was failing. He died a few months later, and 
the funeral obsequies included most of the old 
weird Hawaiian customs. 

It will be interesting to watch the future of 
this beautiful young Hawaiian widow, still in 
the morning of life. The Princess was tall, and 
therefore at this early epoch of her life, her figure 
but slightly indicated the change from voluptu- 
ousness to obesity, which comes to almost every 
Polynesian woman after twenty-five, and often 
earlier if maternity has done its maturing work. 

She was what every observer would call 
superb in her carriage and form. Her color 
was that of the dark brunette, but a peculiar 
pallor indicated other than Anglo Saxon blood 
in her veins. Luxurious hair, almost black, 
framed a face of softly rounded features, and 



96 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

her eyes and teeth gave brilliancy to her expres- 
sion. "Himself" was fascinated by her voice, 
the soft Polynesian voice to which cultivation 
had added its charm. Her manner was that 
of an eager, excitable child, trying to "be good" 
and quiet and dignified. The joy of life ex- 
pressed itself in her every act and word. The 
Princess like all Honolulu women adored the 
United States, and longed to make her home in 
New York. 

A great many Anglo Saxon men have married 
Polynesian women and "lived happily forever 
afterward." But these men have remained on 
the Islands — like the father of the Princess and 
others prominent in the social life there. Ameri- 
cans who became habituated to the Hawaiian 
point of view, cease to draw a color line; but 
this breadth of view does not remain with them 
in the States. The more a man loves his bronze 
skinned wife, the more painful would he find 
the slights and insults to which she would be 
subjected in the United States, and the situa- 
tion would become intolerable. 

An interesting story is told of one of the great 
plantation magnates, a Scotchman who mar- 
ried a handsome native woman. His beautiful 
half-breed children were being educated in 
California, and the father, while on a visit there, 
entered a hotel, and with his wife and children 




r ' 




HONOLULU.— PRINCESS KAIULANI. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 97 

took seats at the dining room table. After a 
few moments the head waiter approached, and 
whispered in the ear of the sugar magnate. 

"Colored people are not allowed in this hotel," 
was what he whispered. The doughty Scotch- 
man restrained his temper and quietly withdrew. 
A few hours later he appeared, alone, and called 
all the hotel employees together. 

"I have bought this hotel," was his astonish- 
ing assertion," and I take charge of it this after- 
noon. You will arrange a table for my family 
to occupy whenever we are here." 

To this day that hotel is one of the resources 
from which the widow draws her large income. 
But all Anglo Saxons who marry native women 
are not millionaires, and there are many de- 
serted wives in Hawaii, whose husbands went on 
a visit to the States, and promised to send for 
their consorts when their business affairs were 
settled. But like badly made coffee — they never 
settled. 

One very beautiful young woman had divorced 
a deserting American husband and married 
again another American. He was in the States, 
and she was eagerly awaiting his cable telling 
her to come to him when I left the Island. Twice 
he had cabled, but only to postpone a day set 
for sailing. In all probability the unfortunate 
woman was again a deserted wife. 

7 



98 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

I met a radiantly beautiful and cultured young 
girl, who had been educated in an American 
college, and possessed all the attractive qualities 
which make a belle. I wondered if she hid in her 
heart that dream so dear to every Island maid 
the world over — marriage with some man of 
social prominence from the great world. She 
was eminently fitted to adorn society, but her 
skin was relentlessly old oak in color. What 
man would dare appear with her in a New York 
theatre or drawing room? 

As in the rest of the civilized Christian world 
to-day, there is in Hawaii a much larger pro- 
portion of ambitious young girls, who have 
acquired an education, and social accomplish- 
ments, than of young men. This leaves the 
Hawaiian girl superior to the marriageable men 
of her own land, but barred by color from marry- 
ing a man whose business or inclinations necessi- 
tate living away from Hawaii. After all the 
color problem, even there, is not settled. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 99 



FOREIGN MISSIONS 

On both the voyage to and from Honolulu, a 
goodly percentage of the passengers were mis- 
sionaries, en route to, or returning from the 
Orient. 

My acquaintance with foreign missionaries 
had been slight, and this was the first oppor- 
tunity to study them at close range. I must 
say, to be honest, that they were, intellectually 
considered, a disappointment. Among nearly 
one hundred men and women, only three im- 
pressed me as being up to the standard one ex- 
pects to find in a public school graduate. Being 
much interested in Oriental religions and philos- 
ophies, I thought it an excellent opportunity 
to gain some information on the subject from 
those who had studied it at close range. Mis- 
taken hope! One man gazed at me with mingled 
disgust and reproach, and refused to admit that 
such a term as "Oriental religion" could be used. 
It was all rank heathenism and idol worship to 
his mind. 

Another asked me to explain the meaning of 
"Karma." 

Another thought reincarnation and trans- 
migration of souls was one and the same thing, 
and so I gave up trying to add to my knowledge 



100 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

on this subject from information gained through 
the missionaries. It seems to me a great mis- 
take for a physician to attend a patient without 
knowing all about his condition, and equally 
a mistake for a missionary to attempt conversion 
of pagans without knowing all about their be- 
liefs — and the origin of their religion. Aside 
from this as an education to be gained, while 
practising the profession of a missionary, such 
a study is important. 

I found these people very earnest and very 
sincere, and what they lacked in liberality of 
thought they made up in patience of purpose, 
and singleness of heart in their one subject to 
Christianize the world. 

The most intellectual and charming woman 
among them, and the most liberal, went first to 
China as a physician, married a missionary, 
and remained there in the mission work. 

As usual on a long sea voyage, there was a 
dance given the last night before coming into 
harbor, and the missionaries, as if to show their 
disapproval of this worldly function, called a 
special prayer meeting. But the woman physi- 
cian slipped away, and tripped the fantastic toe 
for half an hour, and was no doubt benefited in 
mind and body by this diversion and unharmed 
spiritually. 

Just as I felt that the missionaries needed to 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 101 

be broadened in their minds, so I found I needed 
to be broadened by knowing more of their work 
and achievements. 

I had always felt the foreign mission move- 
ment an intrusion on the rights of individuals 
to worship the Creator of the Universe in their 
own way, and that the money used in this field 
of endeavor was sadly needed at home, where we 
have so much ignorance, and cruelty, and crime. 

Talking with the missionaries, however, and 
studying the history of the Hawaiian Islands, 
before and since their advent, I grew into a 
realization that this work was an important 
part in the progress of humanity at large. 

It is the missionary movement which has 
transformed the Fiji Islands from horrible can- 
nibalism to their present kindly and semi-civil- 
ized state, and however we may talk of the loss 
of "charm" which has come to the Hawaiian 
Islands through the missionaries, yet when the 
first missionary came to Honolulu, on the Island 
of Oahu, he found a nude queen lying drunk 
under a tree (intoxicated with some native 
brew) and two drunken consorts at her side. 

The queen became a convert to Christianity 
and left a name to history, bright with the 
lustre of good deeds, noble actions, and large 
human charities. 

In China, the missionaries are helping to free 



102 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

women from the tortures of the deformed foot, 
but this is slow work owing to the slavery of the 
Chinese woman to tradition and custom. One 
woman missionary who had lived with her hus- 
band in the interior part of China for 20 years, 
seemed to think this work promising because of 
this conversion of 250 natives in a score of years. 

In one of these converted families a little girl 
of six years cried pitifully, and finally persuaded 
her mother to bind her young feet in the tortur- 
ing shoe, because the other children laughed at 
her for having natural extremities. 

And all the agony which followed, she bore 
with that stoicism which great heroes and vain 
women equally display. 

The hygienic and medical work done by the 
missionaries is of greater value to the race, 
according to my ideas, than the work of con- 
version from one faith to another. 

Especially valuable is the medical treatment 
given women in the Orient, in China, Japan and 
India, and the education accorded them in 
proper care of their bodies. 

Never until all women are free from slavery 
of all kinds — deformed feet, smothering harem 
veils, and confining bars, sweat shop, factory 
and mine prisons, and humiliating financial de- 
pendence — will the race become what God means 
it to be. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 103 

The missionaries are helping to bring about 
this freedom. 

Heaven speed their work, at home and 
abroad. 

One of the most delightful men we met while 
in Honolulu was Burton Holmes, the world 
famous traveler, writer and lecturer. American 
in feature and cosmopolitan in his appearance 
and manner, a Parisian in perfection of dress, 
English in his well modulated voice and accent, 
he was withal delightfully witty in repartee, 
and a most agreeable partner in a dance. 

At one of the smart functions given in Hono- 
lulu, I became enthusiastic at the charm of the 
place, and of that particular festivity, and gave 
voice to my sentiments, while waltzing with Mr. 
Holmes. 

"Oh, yes," he said, "except that it is not all 
what it used to be in the old days of the King. 
The trail of the missionary is over it all." "But," 
I protested, "how can you say that? listen to 
this glorious wild Hawaiian music, the twang 
of the instruments, the thrill of the men's voices 
as they sing. What is there to remind one of the 
missionary there?" "Oh, but it does," he said. 
"Even in their dance music now-a-days I get 
an echo of "Yes We Shall Gather at the river," 
and "Onward Christian Soldier." 

Again speaking of the great cities of the world, 



104 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Mr. Holmes said: "New York is the only big 
city where horse cars may be seen now. They 
go up 29th St., and back on 28th St., because 
they are ashamed to be seen coming down the 
same track." 

The day before our departure from Honolulu, 
there was a tap at our bungalow door in the 
morning, and in blew — literally "blew" — the 
typical American hustler, Mr. Alexander Hume 
Ford, magazine writer, traveler, promoter of 
progress, and general agent of success for the 
world. I had not seen Mr. Ford for ten years, 
during which time he had been around the world 
length-wise, cross-wise and diagonally, several 
times. In less than ten minutes after he entered 
the door our peaceful bungalow seemed to be- 
come a combination literary bureau, dramatic 
agency, shipping, railroad and information office 
and athletic club. Mr. Ford had only reached 
Honolulu from Australia the previous evening, 
but he had already sketched out plans for beau- 
tifying the city, enlarging its commerce and 
increasing its popularity as a winter resort. My 
head swam as he outlined his ideas to me, and 
then he proceeded to tell me a few things he pro- 
posed to do before I left the following day. 
Knowing me to be a swimmer, he had made ar- 
rangements to teach me the exhilarating sport 
of riding the waves, at Waihihi beach, on a plank; 




Bridge at Honolulu. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 106 

to collaborate in a great Hawaiian drama; to 
visit the Kaiulani school and to have the Gov- 
ernor of the Island read my verses there; to bring 
Burton Holmes with his moving picture camera 
to photograph us all; and finally to introduce 
old Hawaiian customs in the departure of our 
ship the next day, in which native boy drivers 
and a Hawaiian band were to feature for the 
benefit of the Holmes camera. 

All these things were to happen during 24 
hours, but the billow riding, and the drama 
writing, had to be eliminated greatly to the 
regret of Mr. Ford. 

I demurred at the visit to the Kaiulani school. 

"It is impossible to induce the Governor on 
such short notice to read my verses there," I 
said. "Not at all," replied the sanguine Mr. 
Ford. ' 'I know he will come. It only just oc- 
curred to me that this is the 9th anniversary 
of Kaiulani's death. Gov. Cleghorn always de- 
votes the day to her memory at the Royal 
Mausoleum. Now it will be very gratifying to 
him when he knows that we planned this little 
visit and reading in honor of his beloved and 
lamented daughter." 

Mr. Ford dashed out of the door, only to 
return beaming and triumphant in less than an 
hour's time. 

"It is all arranged," he said, "the Governor 



106 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

will be at the Kaiulani school by the time we 
reach there. Burton Holmes is on his way now. 
It will be an interesting and beautiful occa- 
sion." And so it proved. The Governor's party 
and our own met en route, and we were greeted 
by the entire school of several hundred children 
and the staff of teachers, gathered in front of 
the commodious building. Mr. Ford had her- 
alded our coming, and a brief programme was 
consequently prepared. 

There were fifteen nationalities represented 
in the school, of every grade of color, and the 
words, "One Flag, One Country, One God," were 
repeated in English, Japanese, Chinese, Samoian 
and Hawaiian, the entire army of scholars point- 
ing to the Star Spangled Banner with military 
precision, and religious solemnity, which im- 
pressed us deeply. Then the children marched 
into the schoolroom, and the principal made 
a brief and touching reference to Princess Kaiu- 
lani, and presented Governor Frear, who read 
my little tribute to the royal maid's memory 
with much feeling. 

Handsome, famous and popular Jack Atkin- 
son also made an address suitable to the occa- 
sion. Afterward Mr. Holmes aimed his moving 
picture camera at the party as it emerged from 
the school followed by 500 children; while Mr. 
Ford's genial face beamed with approval be- 
cause there was "something doing." 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 107 

A curious and pathetic character in Honolulu 
is a mildly demented Hawaiian, who for a period 
of five years or more has spent a portion of 
each day worshiping before the Statue of King 
Kamehameha which stands in Capitol Square. 

At certain hours of the day he is always to be 
found there, standing or sitting, and frequently 
kneeling to kiss the bronze feet of the statue. 

I had never chanced to see the man, and ex- 
pressing a wish to do so, Mr. Ford immediately 
planned to gratify my curiosity. "Why, he is 
an old friend of mine," he said, "and this is just 
about the hour he will be at his self-imposed 
duty. Let us walk around and see." 

And sure enough, there was the crouching 
figure sitting at a short distance from the statue 
gazing at it with adoring eyes. A simple, vapid, 
inoffensive face turned at Mr. Ford's greeting, 
and smiled an empty smile; but no words issued 
from the weak mouth. 

Led by our irrepressible conductor to the 
street corner where I stood, the pathetic lunatic 
stood staring idly into space while Himself 
snapped his camera on the three of us, greatly 
to his own delight. Himself remarked it was 
hard to decide which simpleton looked most 
simple at that particular moment. 

All that Mr. Ford had planned for a "moving 
picture" on the departure of the boat the next 



108 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

day occurred, just according to his directions. 
There were 67 passengers leaving Honolulu, and 
each passenger wore at least one "lei" on his 
hat, and another on his neck, the gift of friend- 
ship; and some of us were walking flower shops. 
I staggered under wreaths that hung from my 
hat, neck, shoulders and arms, almost all com- 
posed of the beautiful yellow flowers known to 
be my favorite Hawaiian bloom. 

Mr. Ford had brought up ten native diving 
boys, clothed only in a loin cloth and wreaths; 
and these boys presented me with their flowers, 
and received a wreath from me in return. Mr. 
Holmes' camera was busily at work, and the 
Hawaiian band was playing "Aloha Oi." The 
sun was radiant, friends were everywhere, and 
the scene was one never to be forgotten. 

"Himself" was keeping out of the range of 
the camera and watching the scene from nearby 
cover, and then the boat sailed out, and we 
flung some of our wreaths back to friends on 
the pier, and the diving boys began their won- 
derful leaps into the clear waters of the harbor 
after coppers. The most daring leaped from the 
top of the masts, a distance of 60 feet, their 
lithe brown bodies keeping erect in the descent 
to the sea, and reappearing after a moment's 
submersion, holding the coin high in air and 
clamoring for more as they swam beside t 1 ie 
ship far out into the bay. 




Honolulu. — Herself and Ah-Lui. 



;.;• 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



109 



Aloha Oi, lovely Honolulu. Still faithful to 
the belief that Jamaica was more beautiful in 
scenery and climate than Honolulu and its en- 
virons, we yet acknowledged the deeper charm 
in the Hawaiian life. Its pleasures, its people, 
its sights and sounds, all lent greater interest 
to our winter's sojourn than those we had found 
in any other land. 

The Hawaiian National Song of Greeting and Farewell 
ALOHA OE 

By H. M. Queen Liliuokalani 



1 ! i I j j i I 







i. tla - a - * - heo 
1 . Proud'- !» swept 



ka o • - a ■ . - ii3 
(he rain t-luud b\ the 



m 



li Ke 



13 



Hsi 



B±J UJ^ 



fjJj oL 




110 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



Chorus- 



\ - lo - ha 01- a - lo • ha. oe E be o • na - o » na no-ho i - ka li - . - - pa A 

F.ireivell lo tbee ftirf-well tit, tbee ^Tboo rbarroinL'iioi'-uiiuctiu-ii.jiuungibe tow - • ers, One 




f.mJ em -brat" a lio-i a-c au tn - til ue'meet a - gain. 

r-n J tiiu • brace be - Tore I mm' de - part L'ti - - bi we' meet • a -' gaic , 




Used by ptcsiisioE «f a St fluaafi ULtUOKAUIW. 



Copyright by 

Wall, Nichols Co., JB&nolulu 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 111 



JAMAICA AGAIN 

It was early in September that Himself sug- 
gested our third winter cruise in the West Indies, 
beginning with Jamaica, and ending in Bermuda, 
and with the gap between to be filled in by such 
of the greater and lesser Antilles, as time and 
ship service permitted. 

It was on January 9th that we embarked at 
New York on the English Royal Mail ship 
Tagus, with the dear and bright goal of Port 
Antonio again our destination. 

Never was there a prettier winter day shining 
over Manhattan Island than that January 9th, 
and never were there four days of fairer sailing 
on smooth seas. Our dream of arriving in our 
beloved port and seeing it at radiant moon or 
gorgeous sunset, ended in coming into East 
Harbor at nine o'clock in starless darkness, and 
groping our way down the ladder and into the 
small launch by the flickering artificial light. 
East Harbor at Port Antonio never seemed 
habitable to me; always it suggested the back 
yard; and though Hotel Titchfield is architectur- 
ally beautiful from every approach, yet its 
stately front entrance is as much more attractive 
than its back door, as a beautiful woman's face 



112 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

appeals more than her coil of back hair. Never- 
theless it was a joy to again enter its fair halls 
through any door, to look down its cool green 
vistas and out upon its spacious balconies and 
to be greeted by old friends in office, elevator 
and dining room. And it was a joy to be shown 
into our dear old room, and to look out on that 
exquisite remembered panorama, and to be able 
to say with the same conviction on the spot which 
had actuated us at a distance, "Yes, Port An- 
tonio is the most beautiful place we have ever 
seen." 

And we had seen much of the world and many 
places, in the three intervening years since our 
last visit to Jamaica. A few hours later another 
haunting memory was revived, as drifting into 
our open windows came the clear childlike voice 
calling, "Neenah, Neenah, Neenah!" 

It was our parrot friend, still living and still 
calling, and all unconscious that we had re- 
membered her voice in its varying range of 
harmonies and discords for three years. And 
now we seemed to have taken up our life again 
just where we left it before, its broken chords 
becoming a harmony by the voice of "Neenah." 

We had planned to visit many new places in 
Jamaica, to take many jaunts and to become 
acquainted with regions still unfamiliar to us; 
but the lotus spell of Hotel Titchfield seized 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 113 

upon us, and we lived our month of days as in a 
trance. We drove to "Blue Hole," and re- 
newed our acquaintance with its interesting 
chatelaine, Dame Fisher; and we met her great 
niece, a pretty brown girl of fourteen, who 
told us she was reading Lorna Doone, and who 
discussed it more understandingly than any 
white girl of that age we had ever known. She 
was a pupil of Mr. Plant, that second Booker 
Washington, whose influence in developing the 
best in his people, is more far reaching than 
even he knows. 

One day we decided to go in state and call on 
"Neenah." Thus far she had been to us a voice 
only , but a voice that was so "temperamental," 
so vibrant and full of harmony, that it had 
followed us over seas and through strange 
lands. Now we were determined to see the 
feathered source of this voice. A bright Ameri- 
can girl joined us as we sallied forth, and when 
we told her of our errand she said, "How em- 
barrassing it would be if you found it was not 
a parrot after all, but somebody's half-witted 
child you were listening to all these years." 

However, no such embarrassment assailed us, 
but "Polly" herself in splendid feather peered 
at us from between the bars of a great cage, 
standing in a covered arbor at the rear of one 
of the nearby bungalows. So large and roomy 



114 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

was the cage, that I felt like blessing the invalid 
lady who had provided so decent a home for her 
prisoned pet. The cruelty and lack of humanity 
which the average civilized Christian shows 
toward caged birds, puts them on a level with 
savages, who torture shipwrecked mariners. 
The canary bird, born for generations in cap- 
tivity, may find moments of joy in life in such 
cramped quarters as those usually given him, 
but the parrot born free, and brought from his 
native forests to a life of solitary confinement 
in a cage, must suffer unrecognized agonies in his 
narrow quarters. The parrot is by nature a 
social and domestic bird, and can we wonder 
if he becomes petulant and often vicious in the 
life forced upon him? 

Added to other indignities, the parrot, no 
matter whether male or female, is invariably 
dubbed "Polly!" 

"Neenah" surveyed us gravely, with her head 
on one side, walking from wire to wire in pecu- 
liar parrot fashion. Not a word would she 
utter, and in her unfathomable eyes I vainly 
sought the history of her past and the identity 
of that "Neenah" to whom she perpetually 
called each afternoon. 

Afterward, some indiscreet person with the 
hammer which destroys illusions, tried to con- 
vince me that it was "Amelia" which the parrot 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 115 

called. Now science tells us that were there 
no ears there would be no sound. Therefore to 
our ears "Neenah" had become an accustomed 
beloved sound; and so whatever the oldest resi- 
dent of Port Antonio may say, our parrot's 
afternoon call is "Neenah." 

Once we drove — a party of 24 in all — through 
seven miles of gorgeous mountain scenery, to 
the Rio Grande River, where twelve bamboo 
rafts and twelve ebony colored raftsmen waited, 
to take us on a two hours' jaunt down the river. 
Through swift rapids and around sharp curves, 
swirling near the rocky walls in places, and often 
wet to the cuticle by the unapologizing waves, 
the rafting trip down the Rio Grande proved 
novel and enlightening, beside revealing new 
phases of the never-ending beauties of Jamaican 
scenery. 

One day we were visitors during a session of 
the Court in Port Antonio. 

A Chinaman, a Coolie, and several Negroes 
were sworn. The colored men kissed the Bible; 
the Coolie took his oath over a glass of water, 
swearing "By the Sacred Waters of the Ganges," 
and the Chinaman lighted a taper and blew it 
out, signifying that he desired to be so extin- 
guished from existence, if he swore falsely. 

And then the three of them proceeded to 
swear to such contradictory statements, that all 



116 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

of them left the impression on their listeners of 
appalling liars. 

The trial was of a Coolie man, for having sold 
rum on Sunday; and after the confusing array 
of testimony, we went forth believing that how- 
ever temperate or intemperate, guilty or not 
guilty the parties concerned might be, that all 
were absolutely ignorant of the meaning of the 
word TRUTH. 

We were reminded of the impression given 
by an eminent English author a hundred years 
ago, regarding the lack of truthfulness among 
slaves. He said religion, which had only been 
recently taught the Negroes, seemed to culmi- 
nate in an idea that they could swear to a lie to 
incriminate an enemy, and that kissing the 
Bible justified the act. 

With the exception of these experiences, our 
month at Port Antonio was but a repetition of 
pleasures enjoyed before, yet none the less sweet 
and memorable; perhaps the more so from repe- 
tition, as a lace handkerchief taken from a per- 
fumed box and sprayed with sweet scents gives 
forth double fragrance. 

Every evening after sundown, walking along 
the spacious porticos of Hotel Titchfield, we were 
bathed in such delicious odors, that our curiosity 
led us to investigation of the source of the 
incomparably seductive smells. We found they 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 117 

arose from bushes growing profusely about the 
lawns, the "Night Jessamine," so called because 
this spiced flower gives out its fragrance only 
after nightfall. 

The weather during the month of our third 
year in Jamaica sadly misbehaved. We had 
eleven days of continuous clouds without 
any sun; the thermometer fell as low as 
63 degrees one night, and remained at 67 all one 
day; and for eight days there was continuous 
rain. We did not mind it ourselves; with our 
delightful surroundings, our books, our writing, 
and our philosophy of enjoyment of the' 'Now," 
we were well contented. But we were unwilling 
that transient guests should see our much-lauded 
winter Eden with a veil over her face. We 
felt as a fond parent feels when a pretty child 
misbehaves before company. 

There was, beside the weather, a shadow over 
Jamaica; the shadow of Messina, Sicily. Be- 
cause of that recent catastrophe, the world re- 
membered anew the disaster which had befallen 
Kingston two years before; and hundreds of 
travellers who had planned a tour in the West 
Indies, abandoned the idea, fearing to enter 
what is believed to be the Earthquake Zone. 
Many friends wrote us expostulating letters on 
the subject. But we are not of "those who 
through fear of death do all their lives enter into 



118 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

bondage." It is foolhardy to build a home at 
the side of an extinct volcano; but it is weak to 
fear an excursion to that volcano, lest it awake 
to new life at that moment and swallow us. 

In all the annals of history, Port Antonio never 
suffered serious damage through earthquake or 
tidal wave. At the time of Kingston's great 
calamity, Port Antonio only shuddered in sym- 
pathy. Beautiful Hotel Titchfield groaned, and 
for a moment writhed in anguish. But that 
was all. No buildings fell, no lives were lost. 
Therefore, though this winter was one succes- 
sion of earthquake shocks in various parts of 
the globe, we felt no fear at Port Antonio. 

A man of my acquaintance once wrote an 
absurd quatrain which read: 

"What is to be is sure to be, 
Whenever it comes to pass, 

And what can't be, will never be, 
And so keep off the grass." 

We applied this philosophy, and so kept off 
the grass of Fear in the West Indies. 

Among the pleasant people met at the Titch- 
field, the noteworthy couple was Sir Henry and 
Lady Blake. Sir Henry was for eight years 
Governor of Jamaica, and dearly loved by its 
people. He had also been Governor of Ceylon, 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 119 

and the Bermudas, and was now visiting in the 
West Indies. It was our privilege to enjoy 
several conversations with both Sir Henry and 
his wife; and it was a delight to find them both 
as cultured, broad minded, liberal, tolerant and 
appreciative as their advantages in life had 
been unusual. 

This is not always the case; one frequently 
finds people who have had great opportunities 
in the way of wealth, travel and association 
with humanity at large, who have become mere- 
ly bundles of conceit and intolerance and silly 
pride, but this more frequently occurs among 
the "new rich" and those whose successes have 
come in one generation, than among those born 
to honors. 

An American who feels any pride in his own 
country and any desire to maintain that pride, 
is constantly subjected to painful awakenings if 
he travels about the world. 

Whether in the Winter or Summer resort 
hotels of his own or foreign lands, he is sure to 
encounter the type of American which puts our 
country in an unenviable light in the eyes of 
cultured foreigners. 

"The type" is scarcely comprehensive enough 
to cover the ground; for America can produce 
more types of unpleasant personalties than any 
other land on earth, probably because of the 
mixed bloods running riot in American veins. 



130 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

First and flamboyantly foremost of the types 
met in travel is the suddenly rich family. The 
fortune may have been enjoyed ten, fifteen, 
twenty years, but it was acquired after habits 
had been formed and manners had been per- 
mitted to go untrained, and the prominence of 
wealth inspired no ambition save for display. 
Mr. and Mrs. Sudden Rich indulge in morning 
jewels, in many motors and yachts, and they 
may be seen walking out of the dining rooms 
of the best hotels and parading the verandas 
violently brandishing the toothpick. 

No amount of travel, sight-seeing and op- 
portunities for improving their minds and man- 
ners succeeds in changing the vulgarity of their 
deportment. They boast always and every- 
where of the superiority of America over every 
other country, and talk much of their posses- 
sions and the cost of living. 

Almost as offensive and more exasperating is 
the moneyed family which stands "first" socially 
in some small American town, and which has 
enjoyed, and used to a certain degree, oppor- 
tunities for a superficial kind of education and 
culture — the education which leads to the proper 
use of nouns, verbs and adjectives, and the cul- 
ture which includes a few social accomplishments 
but which leaves heart and soul untouched, and 
the mind only awakened to petty personal am- 
bitions and to inordinate conceit. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 121 

It is impossible for the big family in a small 
town, as a rule, to grasp the idea that its posi- 
tion in the great world is about as important as 
the position of a fly on the Eiffel Tower. Such a 
family in a resort hotel is sure to hold itself 
apart, to draw a line marked "exclusive" about 
itself, and to ignore the polite bow and smile 
which every well-bred foreigner or American 
traveller accords to the transient visitor at hotel 
tables, or in casual encounters. It does not 
realize that this haughty and exclusive air at 
once brands it as provincial and limited in its 
horizon. Never is the thorough cosmopolitan 
of wide experience, and of sure social position, 
detected in assuming this silly and pretentious 
attitude of unapproachable exclusiveness, toward 
fellow travellers. It always emanates from the 
village "leader" who has been too self -centered, 
and too self-satisfied with small triumphs, to 
realize how large is the world and how the great- 
est thing in the world, is kindness in the small 
occurrences of life. Young women of this type 
abound in America, and their especial occupation 
in travel is always evident, and often audible, 
criticism of other travellers. 

It never occurs to them or to their parents 
and guardians that a higher type of womanhood 
and a better phase of Christianity would be 
shown by a gracious word, a pleasant look and a 



122 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

kindly act toward humanity. Only in America 
does this young woman prevail; but she prevails 
to an alarming extent; and she marries (be- 
cause in her town and "set" is always found 
some admirer of the "position" of her family), 
and she grows into maturity without ever dis- 
covering how unfounded are her airs, and how 
unlovable are her qualities; and she brings into 
the world another generation which becomes 
more arrogant than herself with unaccountable 
conceit and unfounded pride. This type of 
woman is almost invariably prominent in her 
church, and a "Lady Bountiful" where charity 
can increase her opportunities to shine in a 
limited horizon. 

The arrogance of royalty and titles in Euro- 
pean lands is often spoken of with scorn in 
America; but how much more ridiculous and 
presumptuous is the arrogance of money and a 
pigmy position in a small American town! It 
is no wonder that our foreign neighbors laugh 
our pretensions to an "aristocracy" to scorn 
when they are based on such tottering and 
flimsy claims to human superiority. 

There is only one "superior" quality in the 
world — and that is worth of character. When 
we find this, coupled with brain, education, re- 
finement and culture, we have a foundation for 
"aristocracy." If wealth — clean wealth — is 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 123 

added, it gives elegance to the aristocracy; just 
as good clothing enhances beauty of person, 
but does not create it. 

In an empire or a monarchy, servility is born 
and bred in the minds of the masses toward the 
aristocracy. No one stops to inquire into the 
claim of a Lord, a Prince or a Duchess to assume 
a superior air. But so confident are these 
people, as a rule, of their position, that they 
usually leave such airs to the small tradesman, 
or Manufacturer away from home. 

In a journey through many lands the most 
unapproachable fellow traveller encountered 
was an American heiress; and the most affable 
and agreeable woman was the daughter of a 
long line of titles. 

It is not our very rich — our multimillionaires 
in America— who are doing the most to create 
class distinctions in our republic. 

Many of these people have had sufficient 
experience in the world to realize their own 
limitations, and to make them agreeable men 
and women to encounter casually. In their 
large charities they come often to an understand- 
ing of human nature which is educational. 

But it is the newly rich folk of the smaller 
towns, people who never see Newport or upper 
Fifth avenue, and know New York only as 
shopping guests at the Waldorf-Astoria twice a 



124 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

year, who adopt the most intolerable airs at 
home and abroad, and who wrap themselves 
about with a mantle of exclusiveness; and these 
are the people who slowly but surely are bringing 
about the American Revolution. 

In every interior town, especially the manu- 
facturing towns, of America they are found 
by the score, forming what they believe to be 
the "smart set" of their city; wearing modish 
clothes, driving in motors, talking airily about 
"common people," criticising their neighbors, 
and by every refinement of cruelty endeavoring 
to put down any aspirant for social honor or 
intellectual supremacy who is not in their "set." 

The Czar of Russia, the Kaiser of Germany 
and the King of England combined, would not 
attempt such royal airs as these sons and daugh- 
ters and grandsons and granddaughters of suc- 
cessful tradesmen and manufacturers when 
traveling in their own land or abroad. 

Ridiculous, pitiful and absurd as they make 
themselves in the eyes of a discriminating pub- 
lic, yet they are powerful enough to affect the 
struggling masses as a slow match affects a fuse. 
And some day the explosion will come. 

It will not be the "Muck Rakers" or "yellow 
journalism" which will bring this explosion; it will 
be the intolerable insolence of the small rich 
people of America, stirring to indignation and 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 125 

resentment the striving masses of this great 
republic, which is a republic only in name. 

A dinner was given Sir Henry Blake at the 
Titchfield and the proprietor asked me to write 
a few appropriate lines for decorating the menu. 
I was told that Sir Henry had built many miles 
of good roads and many great bridges while in 
office, that he was the best friend Jamaica ever 
had, and that he was himself devotedly fond of 
the Island. Limited to 12 lines and a brief 
space of time the following verslet resulted: 

JAMAICA. 

The fairest Island in the seas, 

The darling of the sun, 

Her friends abide on every side, 

But in her heart dwells one 

Who loves her for her own dear sake — 

Blake! Blake! Blake! 
He decked her with colossal gifts 
And flung them at her feet; 
He showed her worth to all the earth, 
In splendid bridge and street; 
Then let his name the echoes wake — 

Blake! Blake! Blake! 

It was beautifully printed and set in an ex- 
quisite menu card, by the inimitable genius, 
Mr. Hadley, and was taken away as a souvenir 
by the thirty men guests at the dinner. 



126 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

When Lincoln's birthday, February 12th, 
came, Mr. Hadley again appealed to me to aid 
him in making a souvenir menu for dinner. 
The verses written below were written while he 
held the forms for them: 

LINCOLN, FEBRUARY 12, 1809-1909. 
When God created this good world, 
A few stupendous peaks were hurled 
From His strong hand; and they remain 
The wonder of the level plain. 
But these colossal heights are rare, 
While shifting sands are everywhere. 

So with the race. The centuries pass, 

And nations fall like leaves of grass. 

They die — forgotten and unsung. 

While straight from God some souls are flung 

To live, immortal and sublime. 

So lives great Lincoln for all time. 



SLAVE TIME IN JAMAICA. 
When we go no farther back than 100 years 
and read the story of slavery in Jamaica, we can 
but wonder at the great achievements of the 
negro race since its emancipation in 1839. From 
various ports in Africa, 408,000 negroes were 
brought to Jamaica and enslaved in a space of 
48 years. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 127 

Thousands of these were enticed on ships by 
the gifts of beads, belts, and gew-gaws, only to 
find when they attempted to return to shore that 
they were sailing out on wide seas to foreign 
lands, the property of white abductors. 

The cruelty which existed on these slave 
ships reads like some monstrous fiction of a 
diseased brain. 

Yet it is historical truth, that men and women 
were packed like sardines into these slave ships, 
pinioned by their arms beneath a rail built for 
that purpose, and so conveyed across high seas, 
in sailing vessels crowded to their capacity. 

That the majority were wild savages and 
many of them cannibals, is also true; and that 
in the long run the great law of compensation 
will do its work, in bringing these people out of 
the darkness of ignorance into the light of educa- 
tion, is also true; but this does not excuse the 
white man from the wholly selfish, brutal and 
mercenary methods which actuated him in first 
bringing the negroes to our shores. 

In a government report from Jamaica occurs 
the following sentence referring to the large 
slave trade: 

"What a field is here opened to display the 
comforts and blessings of life, which this com- 
merce distributes among so many industrious 
subjects of the mother country." 



128 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Unquestionably, the majority of slave hold- 
ers were kind in their treatment of them. Slaves 
were well fed, well housed, and well cared for 
when ill, and not over-worked. 

But wherever slavery exists, cruelty in human 
nature is developed; since to be a profitable 
trade, it necessitates buying and selling, and an 
indifference to family ties and human affections. 
When the selling of slaves to other countries 
fell from 5,000 to 2,500 in four years, in Ja- 
maica, consternation in "trade" prevailed. 

Slaves were inventoried, and advertised for 
sale along with mules and donkeys; and they 
were generally believed to be without souls. 

In 1816 the English author of that famous 
old book, "The Monk" (known since as Monk 
Lewis), visited Jamaica to investigate the con- 
dition of estates to which he had fallen heir. 

The subject of slavery was new to him, and a 
perusal of his diary is interesting. He regarded 
the negroes as human beings, and bemoaned 
the fact that he found his slaves ignorant of 
a God or a future life, and that not one of his 
300 slaves could read a line. 

Speaking of their immorality, and their light 
view of robbery or murder, and their disregard 
of the truth, he said: "It appears to me that 
the only means of giving the negro morality is 
through the medium of education." 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 129 

He found Voodooism generally prevailing, 
and the fear of the "Obeah" man taking place of 
fear of a divine being. 

He also found cruel masters in many places 
in Jamaica. Mr. Lewis was himself notably 
kind, and abolished the use of the whip on his 
plantations, and discharged all overseers who 
were detected in any unkindness toward the 
slaves. 

He relates the story of one planter named 
Bedford, who was a human monster. Indulg- 
ing in all kinds of cruelties to his slaves, he 
sent those doomed to a mortal illness, to a 
remote spot known as "The Gully," where they 
were left to die uncared for, thus saving him 
the expense of medical attendance and burial. 

One such victim, however, recovered suffi- 
ciently to make his escape and to obtain his 
freedom, after which Mr. Bedford endeavored 
to reclaim his services, but public indignation 
caused him to desist, which goes to prove that 
such monsters were exceptional. 

But other cases of inhuman treatment of 
slaves occurred, and caused many slaves to 
attempt escape from their masters. 

In 1800, one Pluto, a powerful negro accused 
of being an "Obeah" man, escaped to the moun- 
tains, taking several women with him, and es- 
tablishing a robbers' cave and harem, which 



130 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

gradually grew in numbers and force, until it 
menaced the surrounding plantations. At night 
Pluto descended, and robbed and plundered 
homes and individuals, and usually carried 
away with him another wench to fortify his 
harem. Through his love for rum, he was finally 
captured and executed as an "Obeah" man. 
Presuming upon the fear he had inspired in this 
respect, he asserted on the day of his execution, 
that he had arranged with destiny to bring a 
devastating storm to Jamaica; and that he had 
cast a spell upon the jailer, who would not sur- 
vive the year. 

Oddly enough the worst storm of a decade of 
years laid waste Jamaica plantations; and per- 
haps this fact helped to further frighten the 
jailer, who died before the new year. 

Although this occurred in the year 1800, 
yet in this year of 1909, after the Church 
of England has recognized that negroes have 
souls, and after the Wesleyan Evangelists, 
schools, and freedom for half a century, have 
all done their work, yet Vaudouxism still ex- 
ists in Jamaica. 

It is an evil which dies slowly, and only 
increased and enforced opportunities for edu- 
cation can stamp it out. 

Lady Nugent, wife of the Governor General 
of Jamaica 1801 to 1806, speaks with regret in 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 131 

her journal of the immoral effect upon white 
men produced by slavery, and Mr. Lewis seems 
startled by discovery that all his white over- 
seers and bookkeepers had their favorite col- 
ored "housekeepers" with variegated shades of 
children and often their unconcealed harems. 
The custom of colored mistresses of white men 
engaged in Jamaican enterprises has not ceased; 
but is less openly indulged, in this era. 

The clarification of color in Jamaica is given 
as follows: 

A white man and negress produce a mulatto. 

A white man and mulatto, produce a terceron. 

A white man and terceron produce a quar- 
teron. 

A white man and quarteron produce a quin- 
teron. 

After that, all are legally considered white 
and during slavery times were free born. 

It is stated as an established fact that two 
mulattoes cannot produce offspring. The legiti- 
macy of any child born to such a union is ques- 
tioned. Either mulatto, married to a white, 
or to a negro, however, becomes fertile. 

It was the rule of plantations in Jamaica dur- 
ing slavery times, that the mulatto boys and 
girls should not become field hands, but that 
the boys should learn trades and the girls act 
as house maids. So from the beginning, there 



132 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

was an incentive for the black women to be- 
come the mistresses of white men. 

Slavery was the friend to promiscuous asso- 
ciation of the sexes; Women slaves were cen- 
sured if they did not breed children as often as 
nature allowed, and marriage bonds were not 
known among them. 

Can we wonder then, that it remains a difficult 
matter, after the lapse of so short a period of 
time, to inculcate moral ideas of the relation of 
the sexes in these people? 

Naturally strong in their animal instincts, 
inheriting wild and untrammeled impulses from 
their African forbears, and license and lawless- 
ness from their white progenitors, should we not 
feel it incumbent upon us to give them every 
opportunity, with time and patience to reach a 
higher state of development? 

They did not become citizens of our world 
through their own will or wish; they were stolen 
from their own country. They were kept in 
ignorance and bondage; they were encouraged 
in immorality, and now in a half century we 
suddenly become hypothetically proper and 
moral and cry out against the instincts of the 
colored race, which we declare are quite beyond 
the reach of education. 

"It is a race apart by itself," we say. 

But while this is true, we are responsible for 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 133 

this race in our world. We must suffer the con- 
sequences of our own enormous misdeeds toward 
this race. 

In education lies the only key to the awful 
problem. 

A fine line of distinction is drawn in the use of 
terms referring to dark skinned people of the 
West Indies, and the United States. The 
negroes are the pure blooded Africans. The 
colored people are those in whose veins the blood 
of white men runs riot. 

Curiously enough, the colored people feel 
themselves superior in every respect to their 
black kinsmen. The lighter their color, the 
greater their pride, and yet the black African 
represents a purer race-type and has a more 
moral pedigree, once we stop to analyze the 
conditions surrounding each. 

The recent discovery of a buried city in Abys- 
sinia, of artistic and architectural beauty, shows 
that • the ancient race of Negroes possessed 
originality and constructive ability, and cul- 
ture. 

These qualities are curiously lacking in the 
full blooded black people of Jamaica and the 
United States. When Jamaica was owned by 
the English and Spanish sugar planters, and 
when it was a port for the great trading ships 
of the world, its natural beauties were supple- 



134 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

merited by handsome and stately residences. 
Now one may drive or motor for an entire day 
about the Island, and see scarcely a residence 
that is distinguished for its beauty or attractive- 
ness. Only a few ruins even remain of the his- 
toric mansions, while here and there, scattered 
over the Island, are the broken walls and 
foundations of old sugar mills. The chimney 
of one of these, from which stately trees are 
growing, is one of the picturesque sights of 
Jamaica. 

The dreadful squalor of the houses in which 
the peasant population of Jamaica lives, is one 
of the most discouraging features of the colored 
problem. Hundreds of the aboriginal grass 
thatched huts are to be seen in a drive through 
the mountains and valleys; but less pitcuresque 
and more unsightly are the hovels which serve 
as residences in the villages and along the road 
side. 

The town of Port Antonio despite its glorious 
situation, is disgraceful in its delapidation. Many 
of Jamaica's villages are a blight on the face of 
beautiful nature. Even the well-to-do colored 
people who have progressed financially and in- 
tellectually, toward a better civilization, lack 
home making ideas. 

In the house of one such woman, who was 
pursuing a successful business, and whose sur- 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 135 

roundings indicated prosperity, torn cheap lace 
curtains, and soiled wood work (which would 
have been white with the application of soap 
and water) rendered the drawing room hideous. 
Glimpses into bungalows and cabins by the way- 
side, while driving or walking, invariably reveal 
disorder and dirt. Yet there are exceptions to 
this rule; in one little mountain cabin five miles 
from a village I saw order, neatness and good 
taste displayed in the arrangement and decora- 
tions of the home; and love, courtesy and re- 
finement characterized the deportment of the 
hostess. A resident of the Island tells me there 
is a marked improvement noticeable during the 
last 20 years, but improved conditions ought to 
be the prevailing ones, at this time, so many 
years after the burden of slavery was lifted from 
Jamaica. But educational opportunities have 
not been plentiful, and the taxation imposed 
by England, has been energy sapping and 
poverty breeding. 

Divorce is not frequent among the colored 
people of Jamaica perhaps because so many 
people establish family relations, without ob- 
serving the little ceremony of marriage. It is 
difficult to give the negro race ideals on this 
subject, and the large percentage of partly 
white children born each year to colored mothers 
indicates that the influence of the white man 



136 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

is not absolutely toward morality: and always 
with pride, and never with shame, the colored 
mother displays her light skinned child, often 
remarking "His father was white." 

The effect of Americans upon the Island of 
Jamaica, has been stimulating to trade, and to 
the development of its resources and industries. 
Jamaica owes a great debt of gratitude to Cap- 
tain Baker, and to the United Fruit Company, 
But the American example has not been admir- 
able in all respects, in its results, upon the col- 
ored people. It is a curious fact that wherever 
American feet make a beaten path, the flowers 
of economy, politeness and simplicity wither 
and die. On our first visit to the Island of 
Jamaica, the natives were noticeably polite and 
courteous; everyone encountered on mountain 
passes or in the village streets, courtesied, 
smiled, bowed, or spoke a pleasant word of 
greeting. Flowers were flung into carriages, 
and the present of a half penny or a penny gave 
delight. A copper was considered ample re- 
ward for posing for a kodac. Today they de- 
mand one or two shillings, for such a service; 
their flowers are no longer offered, and if bought, 
are placed at florist prices; and where ten gave 
the pleasant greeting as they passed, one gives 
it now. 

America's brusque manners, and money stand- 
ards have been adopted by them. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 137 

The rhetoric used by the colored people of 
even the most humble classes (for there are 
social grades there as elsewhere) is astonishing 
in its pedantic tendencies. In the United 
States, the same peculiar love for many sylla- 
bled words exists, among the negroes; but fre- 
quently (if not oftener) these words are im- 
properly applied. 

In Jamaica I seldom heard a long or unusual 
word misused; and I have stood in silent wonder 
while my chambermaid, or bell boy, made re- 
marks which savored, in diction of a careful 
study of an Encyclopedia or Standard Diction- 
ary. 

In wider and more thorough educational 
advantages, lies the hope of the colored race 
both in America and the West Indies. 

More money, more schools, more teachers, 
better salaries, is what the Island needs. 

The East Indian Coolie population of Ja- 
maica lends a most artistic touch to the monot- 
ony of the native type: slender limbed, delicately 
formed people, with clear cut handsome faces, 
eyes of great lustre, and long straight hair, 
their attire adds to their attractions. The men 
are clothed in a one-piece graceful garment, 
which was once white, and may probably be- 
come so again in time; and if by chance you see 
it when first donned, it makes a pleasing picture 



138 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

finished by the turban head dress. The deer- 
like legs and slim feet are bare. The Coolie 
women are rarely as handsome as the men; 
but they present the appearance always of 
having prepared themselves for a costume ball. 
Their gay colored skirts, and long mantle 
falling from the crown of the head to below 
the waist, makes a most effective picture. 
Anklets of silver, bracelets below and above 
the elbow, necklaces, and "brow laces" and ear 
rings, leave still another place to decorate. The 
left nostril is bored, and a jewel is inserted. 
The workmanship of this jewelry is fine and 
odd, and it is hand executed, and is largely 
sought by tourists. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 139 



THE CRUISE AND THE CIRCUS. 

There came a day, when at the end of a 
month, the lotus dream, of pleasure and peace, 
at Port Antonio, was broken; and we awoke to 
the realization that we were to exchange the 
luxurious comforts of Hotel Titchfield, for the 
uncertain accommodations, of a Cruising mer- 
chant steamer. Much as I love sailing forth to 
new ports, with no purpose and no responsi- 
bility, save to follow where Himself leads, yet 
this giving up of the flesh pots of Egypt, cost 
me an effort. It was the beginning of the very 
gayest season of the winter; and brilliant func- 
tions, dear to my frivolous feminine heart, all 
culminating in a costume ball, had to be sac- 
rificed, together with our delightful quarters, 
and homey associations. 

Nevertheless I packed away all fair raiment, 
in what we termed "The Bermuda Arc," and 
bravely set forth with as little baggage as de- 
cency and cleanliness would permit, to take 
passage on "The President." 

It was an eighteen hundred ton boat, with 
only fourteen first-class state rooms; and it was 
bound for St. Thomas, and would make three 
ports in Haiti, two in Santo Domingo and two 



140 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

in Porto Rico, taking on cargoes of coffee, cocoa, 
sugar, tobacco and cotton. 

All these places were but names and dots on 
maps to me; and there was a certain pleasurable 
excitement, once we embarked, in knowing that 
we were to see these "dots" develop into actual 
localities. Our little boat proved to be spic 
and span in cleanliness; and our stateroom was 
far more comfortable than many a one we had 
occupied on larger ships. But the "Ladies' 
cabin" was like a doll's house; the deck space 
was limited; and the dining saloon seemed 
more suited to a boarding house than to an 
ocean steamship, carrying tourists and pleasure 
seekers. 

Every stateroom, first and second class, was 
filled, and down stairs were twenty-six steerage 
passengers all belonging to one family of Spanish 
Gypsies en route for Santo Domingo, accompan- 
ied by two trained bears and a monkey. 

Soon after sailing from Kingston Harbor, the 
story was abroad that our passenger list in- 
cluded a circus company on a winter business 
trip in the West Indies. 

We began looking about among the thirty or 
more passengers, trying to identify in our own 
minds, those people we have all been accus- 
tomed to see from circus stalls, but have seldom 
observed at closer range. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 141 

Sorry indeed is the lot of one who has never 
known the joy and excitement of a first circus; 
and but half lived in emotion, has been the life 
of any man or woman, who has not at some 
early period of existence, contemplated with 
ecstacy, the possibility of running away from 
home, and becoming an expert bareback and 
trapeze performer. 

There had been such a period in my own 
childhood, and I recalled the thrill which trav- 
ersed my small frame, when I imagined reaching 
such perfection in my (mentally) chosen career, 
that, attired in a spangled gown, I could stand, 
poised stork like, on a flying steed, and kiss my 
fingers to a wildly applauding audience. 

And now here I was, cheek to jowl with these 
very performers who had been my early envy. 

But how to locate them? A rough sea caused 
the usual disappearance of the majority of 
women passengers for a day or two, but before 
they disappeared I had seen a pale and tired 
looking woman, of fragile physique, sitting on 
deck, and giving a Radiant Baby his natural 
sustenance in the natural way, and near her stood 
a proud looking young father, watching the 
proceeding with a contented smile. 

Then the pale little mother disappeared, but 
the Radiant Baby, whose name was nothing less 
than Virgil, was carried about by the proud 



142 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

father, and again by a quiet and dignified 
woman, who proved to be the Radiant Baby's 
aunt; and whose vigorous young daughter of 
twelve looked like a blond Hebe in spectacles. 

Rumor had it that these were all circus 
people: but as for us, we classified them as the 
mother, and the father, and the aunt, and the 
cousin of the Radiant Baby, Virgil, who had 
become the ship's baby and everybody's darling. 

So amiable and philosophical a baby of six 
months, not to mention his precocity, never lived 
before, I am sure. Temperamental, too, was he; 
and wise in color lore. Always springing to my 
arms with adorable smiles, once he drew back 
with quivering lips and refused my embrace. 
"Because," explained his father, "you are 
wearing a black gown, and Virgil strongly dis- 
approves of black." 

Then there was the handsome young French 
girl, with the face one finds on an old Greek coin, 
and her stalwart Italian husband: a model pair 
quietly devoted. And there was the big, good- 
natured man, who was Virgil's uncle-in-law, and 
a boy Adonis who was his own uncle, and the 
elderly man with a sober face, all said to be 
"circus people." But we got none of the spirit 
of the circus of our youthful remembrance from 
these everyday folk, with their family ties and 
their quiet ways. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 143 

Down stairs, in the steerage, were six mik- 
white horses and two weirdly intellectual mules, 
all part of the same company. 

And then one night, after a whole week of 
cruising, and stopping at strange ports, and 
going ashore in small boats, we came to Santo 
Domingo, close alongside the big pier, and we 
heard much movement and stir; and the beauti- 
ful milk-white horses and wise mules came forth 
and were led away and we were told the "Circus" 
was going to give a performance in town that 
night. 

A few hours later we were sitting in a "pri- 
vate" stall, close to the improvised circus ring, 
and the band was blaring, and the circus "su- 
pers" were bringing out a big globe and putting 
up a "teter board" (such as we had, of old, num- 
bered among our most valued possessions in 
childhood), and suddenly out came a dainty 
little figure, all in white silk tights, and with a 
bravely plumed hat set well back on her small 
head. Lightly as a feather she floated upon this 
globe and began to roll it under her slender feet 
up the length of the "teter board" and down 
again, all the while smiling and blowing kisses 
to the audience of varigated colors. 

Now, wonderful to relate it was no other than 
the tired and fragile little mother of the Radiant 
Baby Virgil. 



144 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Then out came the whitest of all the milk 
white horses; and into the ring that object of 
childhood's mingled fear and admiration, the 
"Ring Master," with his cracking whip, and 
next, before our wondering eyes, leaped the 
agile form of "the most famous and fearless bare- 
back rider of the world," a woman in a spangled 
gown. The Ring Master, the ogre of our child- 
hood, cracked his whip, the milk-white horse 
accelerated his rapid pace, the "most famous 
woman equestrienne of the world" pursued him 
with the fleetness of a deer; she grasped his flow- 
ing mane with one hand, and lo! she stood poised 
upon his back on one foot and smiled and waved 
gay hands to the audience, even as I had dreamed 
of doing in a dim past, my noble ambition flag- 
ging only at thought of the terrible Ring Master. 

And now behold! Here was the Ring Master! 
no longer an ogre, but the kind husband of the 
equestrienne and the good-natured uncle-in-law 
of the Radiant Baby; and "the most famous 
woman bareback expert in the world," who was 
she? Alas! not the mysterious fairy of our child- 
hood's dreams, who had run away from a con- 
mon-place home of wealth, to enter on the won- 
derful and exciting career of the circus as of old 
we love to think of her. 

She was, in sooth, no other than the amiable, 
middle-aged aunt of the Radiant Baby and the 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 145 

mother of the blond Hebe in spectacles — the 
blond Hebe, who had shown us to our reserved 
box — all unconscious that her voluptuous young 
beauty was drawing the bold glances of many 
men of mixed bloods in the motley throng which 
composed the Santo Domingian circus audience. 

And then came two special acts in quick suc- 
cession; an expert tight-rope performance, in 
which a young Adonis distinguished himself by 
dancing the Merry Widow waltz on a taut wire, 
and the conquest of the weirdly intellectual 
trick mule, by an acrobat in a mask and bag; 
and these marvellous beings proved to be just the 
proud father and the fond young uncle of the 
Radiant Baby Virgil! 

Next came the handsome young French girl 
with the face of a Greek coin; and her stalwart 
Italian husband, both handsomer and more 
classic than ever, in their flesh-colored-tights; 
and what feats of prowess were theirs; perform- 
ances calling for strength and agility, which 
must have required the unremitting labor of a 
lifetime. To me there has always been some- 
thing admirable and beautiful, in this domina- 
tion of the human body by the will, which sets 
itself the task, and never falters in the effort 
toward attainment. 

The intellectual feats of geaasus do not stir me 
with the same enthusiasm which the trained 
acrobat inspires. 

10 



146 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

For rarely does the intellectual genius owe his 
accomplishments so much to persistent effort, 
and unremitting will power, as does the athlete 
and the acrobat. Of times too, we find the liter- 
ary, the artistic, and the musical genius, a self 
indulgent gourmand, or a sensual sot; but never 
the acrobat, for control of the body necessitates 
control of the appetites and passions. 

After we had all embarked again upon our 
ship, I talked with the circus performers of their 
work, and interesting it proved, to listen to their 
histories and their ambitions, and to obtain their 
point of view. 

The woman bareback rider and her two 
young brothers had been born in the circus ring, 
so to speak. 

Their father was an old circus man, and he 
began to train his children for the work in their 
infancy. The aunt of the Radiant Baby had 
made her first appearance as a bareback rider 
at the age of eight, and the wire-walker and the 
ruler of the trick mule were acrobats at ten. 

The equestrienne had reached a time of life 
when she was longing for a more peaceful ex- 
istence. She hoped to soon retire. No, she 
had not educated her daughter, the blond Hebe, 
for the "profession." Neither had her brother 
any intention of educating the Radiant Baby, or 
Miss Golden Locks (Virgil's eight-year-old sis- 
ter) for the circus life. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 147 

"Not because we think our profession isn't 
good enough for children," said Virgil's father, 
with a certain proud defence in his voice, "but 
because there is no longer any demand for 
quality in our line of work; circus managers want 
only quantity. 

"We have given our lives to making ourselves 
experts in the business. But along comes some 
Cheap Jack who has trained for six weeks in a 
circus act, and he gets as big a salary as the best 
artist among us; it's discouraging, and we don't 
want our children to go into it." 

Meanwhile never was the double influence of 
inheritance and example more fully illustrated 
than in Miss Golden Locks. 

Other little maidens on the ship walked up 
stairs; she bounded; other little maids stepped 
over door sills, she leaped; and from every pos- 
sible pendant thing she improvised a trapeze 
or a turning-bar and swung herself in midair. 

And the Radiant Baby? With the vigor of 
the bullfighter in his six-months' spine and a 
world of ambition in his precocious eyes, can 
even the classic name of Virgil keep him from 
the profession of an acrobat? 

To the girl with the face of the Greek coin I 
said: "You must long at times for a quiet life 
and to give up this gypsying career and all your 
hard work." 



148 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

She looked at me in astonishment. "Never," 
she replied, "whenever I have an idle week I am 
ennuied, bored; I love the life." 

"You have been long in it?" I asked. 

"Always," she answered. "My grandparents 
and my parents were all acrobats. I cannot re- 
member when I began to train for this life. 
And I have always loved it. I would not want 
any other work." 

Then I asked the father of the Radiant Baby 
about his wife. "Was she born in the profes- 
sion?" I queried, "like you and your sister and 
the French girl?" 

"Oh, dear no," he answered. "She was a 
school teacher when I married her. Not until 
after our little girl was born did she think of 
such a thing as becoming one of us; she grew 
very lonesome with my long absence, and one 
day she told me she was practicing a circus act; 
and so she learned the globe-rolling turn, and 
that gave her a chance to be with me." 

Somehow the little story went to my heart. 
She was so frail and so timid; just a little every 
day sort of wife and mother, and I could imagine 
how she had fallen in love with the handsome 
young wire-walker and trapeze performer while 
the circus visited the country village where she 
taught school; and then came the lonely months 
of separation and the desire to be with her 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 149 

husband; and then the wish to be of help, not 
hindrance; and so the little circus turn was 
evolved out of the heart of love. 

A pretty little story surely; and all the pret- 
tier because the parties involved saw nothing 
unusual in it. 

And the sober-faced elderly man we had seen 
about the ship! 

Who was he? 

Why, he was the Clown! 



150 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



HAITI. 

Whatever hope one may entertain for the 
future of the African race, after studying the 
conditions in the United States and Jamaica, 
a visit to Haiti leaves but one opinion possible. 

There is small hope for the race save as it is 
guided, directed and assisted by the Anglo 
Saxons. 

Haiti is the spot on which was erected the 
first European fort in the West Indies. It is 
called La Navidad or "The Nativity" in honor 
of the day Columbus came ashore at Guarico 
or Cape Haitian. This fort was destroyed and 
the garrison massacred, before the return of 
Columbus in 1494. 

A colony of French people settled in Haiti 
later, and it became known as the "Little Paris 
of America" and was remarkable for its ele- 
gance and prosperity. 

In 1697 the French had through treaty be- 
come possessed of large tracts of land and had 
established splendid plantations and imported 
negro slaves to work their estates. Extreme 
cruelty is related of these slave owners; and at 
the beginning of 1791, the negroes who had in- 
creased to a formidable army, combined in an 




Haiti. — A Shopping Street. 




Haiti. — Only Piece of Art Work. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 151 

insurrection, and attained, under the leader- 
ship of Toussant L'Overture, their freedom, and 
the ownership of Haiti. The French were mas- 
sacred, and those who survived were driven out 
of the Island. Later Napoleon recaptured Haiti 
but was unable to retain it, and after years of 
bloody wars, and frightful atrocities, Haiti be- 
came finally the possession of the slaves; and 
it is today, after more than one hundred years, 
owned and ruled by the descendants of the 
slaves who were imported by the French. 

Every right minded student of human nature, 
every lover of justice, must feel great sympathy 
for these people, and as he reads the history of 
Haiti, he must rejoice, theoretically, that the 
slaves obtained the Island. 

But alas, and alas, for his state of mind when 
he visits Haiti and investigates the conditions 
which have been produced by this freedom of 
the Haitian negroes. 

The splendid plantations of coffee, cotton, 
and dyewood, have become wild fields; the 
beautiful roads built by the French, are almost 
impassable for any but the pedestrian or eques- 
trian; the strong bridges are broken and de- 
cayed, the cities where wealth, civilization, and 
commerce produced beauty and comforts, have 
degenerated into conglomerations of hovels, 
where filthy streets and filthier human beings 



152 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

send foul stenches to pollute the soft air. From 
the harbor these Haitian cities greet the eye, like 
exquisite pictures against the gorgeous back- 
ground of mountain ranges; but approached 
they strike the nostrils and the vision with 
brutal disillusionment. 

The old plantations of coffee and cotton re- 
main the source of supply for the natives. Un- 
cared for and uncultivated, yet so rich is the 
soil, and so wonderful the climate of Haiti, that 
the harvests are plentiful. 

Those who care to work, go into the mountains 
and fields, and gather coffee, cotton and cocoa. 
These products are sold to the commission mer- 
chants, who are obliged to pay to the Govern- 
ment officials a duty of $3 for every hundred 
pounds before exporting. This duty goes into 
the pockets of the officials; and so Haiti has no 
fund for keeping up its highways and its bridges, 
and no means for establishing a system of 
sewerage, or lighting its town with electricity. 

The city of Jackmel (the second Haytian 
city in size) might be made one of the most ex- 
quisite and delightful winter resorts of the 
world, were America or England at the head of 
the Haitian government. The superb bay, is 
partially surrounded by coral reefs; the moun- 
tains rise behind it, magnetic, and alluring, the 
brilliant hued waters, afford amusement for the 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 153 

lover of boating or fishing, but there is not 
where to lay the head, and scarcely where to 
set the foot, for any civilized being who wan- 
ders into Jackmel searching for comfort. 

The Government provided Jacmel with an 
electric light plant, but there was not sufficient 
money to maintain it, or sufficient enterprise to 
insist upon its completion, and so it was aban- 
doned after two weeks time, and its useless poles, 
unattached wires, and unlighted globes add to 
the general effect of ruin and dilapidation every- 
where seen; testimonials to Haiti's lack of system. 

No white man is allowed to own property, or 
to have a voice in the Government of Haiti. 

A few strangers have succeeded in gaining 
some privileges, however, and wherever the 
white man's wedge has entered there may be 
seen progress and improvement. 

In 1850 an exploring and enterprising French- 
man by the name of Vital came to Haiti. He 
liked the climate and he entered into arrange- 
ments with the natives which resulted in his 
being allowed certain concessions, enabling him 
to rent property and erect buildings. The 
finest and most attractive dry goods establish- 
ment in Jacmel is conducted by Madam Vital, 
and her goods are bought direct from Paris. 
All the children of this family have received an 
American and European education, and the 



154 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

oldest son, Mr. I. B. Vital, has been for eight 
years the American Consul agent of Jacrnel. 

It was our privilege to drive with this cul- 
tured young man to his country house three 
miles from Jacmel, at Boudoin. 

A more sylvan retreat with more alluring 
environments, could not be imagined; but the 
almost inaccessible roads made the journey 
painful for man and beast. These roads with 
ordinary care for the last half century, would 
have remained fine thoroughfares. French taste 
and cosmopolitan culture, were everywhere evi- 
dent in both the town and country house of Mr. 
Vital; proving that enterprise, industry and a 
desire for beauty, can overcome even the seem- 
ingly insurmountable obstacles to comfort and 
cleanliness, which exist in Haiti. 

The One newspaper published in Jacmel is 
"L' Abeille" (The Bee). It is a small four page 
weekly, and it breathes the spirit of progress, 
freedom and national pride. 

In an editorial of last April it said: "We boldly 
stand for the interests of the people, and the 
country; not for those of a few individuals. 
Our financial conditions are not such as give us 
the influence which we desire, but it is gratifying 
to think that soon our country will manifest a 
notable amelioration of its troubles, and the cost 
of living will be lessened." 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 155 

This hope was due to the faith which existed 
throughout Haiti in the honor and uselfishness 
of the new President Mr. Simon. Almost every 
one of the preceding rulers of the Black Republic 
has been exiled, assassinated, or driven to com- 
mit suicide by outraged and infuriated subjects. 

The Republic has been dominated by ignor- 
ance, indolence and thievery, and its people 
have been unable to rise above the conditions 
imposed upon them by those in power. 

Mr. Simon is the idol of the hour and he seems 
to have the interests of his country at heart. 

The "New Council" met in Jacmel and made 
the following report, which was published in the 
"Bee," in April 1909: 

"Somewhere about 1877-1878, under the late 
Desilus Lamour, at that time Communal Magis- 
trate, of lamented memory, this town was often 
offered as a model to its sisters of the Republic, 
both in respect to the regular carrying on of its 
administration and its sanitary condition. Ac- 
cordingly I ought to hasten to point out that at 
that epoch, the deficit of the Budget of this 
administration was filled without difficulty by 
the District Counsel, by means of a part of the 
percentage which it deducted from the State 
receipts. This then is the time to wish for the 
re-establishment of that useful institution, all 
the more so that it appears in black and white in 
our fundamental Pact. 



156 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

"Now, since the Government has taken upon 
itself to fill this deficit, let us hope that it will do 
it in the interest of the town. 

' 'I will remind you, Gentlemen Councilors, that 
since the fire of 1896, the town of Jacmel has 
not been lighted. It was only in 1906, ten years 
later, after having acquitted certain important 
debts which the town had previously contracted 
for the Communal service that we were able to 
begin the lighting of perhaps fifty lamps. It 
was after the installment of this lighting which 
took place in May 1906, that the Legislative 
body in October of the same year, granted us a 
monthly subsidy of two hundred piasters. 

"The new Council is undoubtedly inspired with 
the best intentions. If it finds all. the co- 
operation which it has a right to expect, being 
the outcome of the popular will, it will place 
this unhappy town upon a footing worthy of its 
former renown. As for you, my dear colleagues, 
I do not think it out, of place to remind you that 
it is the duty of all of us to march hand in hand 
and for the greatest good of the town. We 
would wish that it were always so, in order to 
remain more and more worthy of the free suf- 
frages of our fellow-citizens. This would also be 
one way of proving to all those who struggled 
'per fas et nefas' in order to paralyze, even to 
prevent our advent here — an advent, however, 




Haiti. — In The Market Place. 




Haiti. — The City of Aouin. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 157 

full of disinterestedness — that they were doing 
it without plausible reason; it would be proving 
once more to every bold and fiery journalist 
that our fellow-citizens made no mistake in 
calling us to look after their interests; that any 
campaign of this kind against us would be rather 
absurd and derisive. I need not tell you, my dear 
colleagues, that our fellow-citizens have placed 
all their trust in us and if they have been for- 
tunate enough this time to do it, it is owing to 
that new era of liberty which was brought to us 
with the Government of General Antoine Simon. 

"Yes, it must be recognized, this new era is not 
only a great relief to us, but a wholesome balm 
for our nerves which for many years have been 
numb. 

"For, in truth, what was our condition before 
this happy change? That of caged birds, of 
prisoners in a dungeon. 

"Oh let us bless Heaven a thousand times for 
having freed the Republic of this deplorable, 
this odious state of things! 

"I will not conclude without expressing the 
wish of receiving, inventoried, all that belongs 
to the town, that it may be known in what con- 
dition the reins of this administration are handed 
over to us. 

"Meanwhile, Gentlemen, let us cry with a 
unanimous voice: 



158 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

"Long live the President of Haiti! 

Long live the Communal Institution!" 

There is something inexpressibly pathetic in 
the effort of a few earnest citizens in each town 
of Haiti striving against the corruption of 
officials, and the ignorance and indolence of a 
vast majority of the people. If their industry 
and perseverance were equal to their rhetoric 
we might hope they would succeed. 

However behind the age Haiti may be in 
many things, it seems to have kept step with 
America, England and France, in the matter 
of Divorce. In one copy of "The Bee" ap- 
peared the following notices: 



Announcement 

The undersigned has the honor to announce 
to the public, that he is no longer responsible 
for the conduct of his wife, born Marietta Gar- 
rard, who has abandoned his home; and against 
whom he has instituted divorce proceedings for 
reasons which will be shown. E. N. Frederique. 

The undersigned has the honor to announce 
to the public, that he is not responsible for the 
acts of his wife, born Rossana Auguste, who has 
left the marital bed and board, etc. Signed, J. 
Vaugelas. 

The undersigned, Diogene Iohoir, proprie- 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 159 

taire, living at his domicile in the rurale section, 
de Fond Melon, declares to the public that he 
is no longer responsible, etc., for the acts of his 
wife born Marthe Janvier, etc., etc. 

It was whispered that the majority of edu- 
cated Haitiens, those who had traveled in 
Europe and the States, are dissatisfied with 
their condition in Haiti and long for annexa- 
tion. 

America does not need Haiti; but Haiti needs 
America or England, as a sick soiled child needs 
a nurse and a bath. It has been so sick and so 
soiled for a century, that it can hardly be ex- 
pected to have strength enough to restore itself 
to health and cleanliness. 

President Antoine Simon has a harder task 
ahead of him than Hercules performed in clean- 
ing the Augean stables. 



VAUDOUXISM IN HAITI. 

Quite apart from the screaming, dirty throng 
of the market place in Aux Cayes, Haiti, a 
strange looking man at once repelling, and com- 
pelling, by force of his combined ugliness and 
strength, sat cross-legged before a smouldering 
blaze. Now and then he stirred the contents 
of a steaming pot. He seemed indifferent to 
the gaze of the throng, and yet an observer knew 



160 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

that he was conscious of it, and that in some 
way he felt himself superior to those who moved 
about him. The man was of powerful build; 
and his large head was covered with wooly hair, 
peculiarly knotted, and of a hideous red colour, 
which suggested clotted blood. His features 
were wholly African, and his skin was mahog- 
any, shading into ebony tones. 

The few unclean rags which composed his 
costume, were worn with a certain dignity. 

The crowd surged about him, buying, selling, 
haggling and chattering a curious French dia- 
lect, yet always leaving a free space about the 
squatting figure. 

There was something weird, sinister and 
dreadful in his appearance, which made him 
remarkable, even in that mob of dreadful 
people. Who, and what was he, this squalid 
and disgustingly unwashed semi-savage, in the 
Black Republic of Haiti? That question pre- 
sented itself a half dozen times, after the man, 
and the city on the coast of Haiti, had passed 
from sight. 

It was several days later, that an answer to 
this query, blood curdling in its possibility, 
presented itself to mind. 

I chanced upon the book of Sir Spencer St. 
John, entitled "Haiti the Black Republic." Mr. 
St. John had been a resident of Haiti, occupying 




Haiti. — Entrance Gate of Boudoin, Mr. Vital's Country 
Place at Jacmel. 




Haiti. — A Fellow Passenger on Voyage. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 161 

an official position, for more than ten years. 
In his chapter on Vaudoux practices and rites, 
the author describes the priests who preside over 
these savage ceremonies, as "men noticeable for 
their peculiarly knotted hair." 

A man who is selected by the devotees of 
Vaudouxism, to be their priest, is called "Papa 
Loi;" and his consort becomes their priestess, 
and is "Mama-loi." 

They are regarded with awe and reverence 
by the multitude; and they, in turn, pay rever- 
ence to the "sacred serpent," kept in secret 
temples and churches, and consulted in all im- 
portant matters for direction and guidance. 

To the Vaudoux priest, the serpent is the 
expression of supreme wisdom and power. 

This belief, has come down from unrecorded 
ages, through the African race; and its rites and 
ceremonies have been associated with revolting 
crime, and indescribable obscenity. They begin 
with drunkenness, proceed with licenciousness 
and end, often with murder and canibalism. 
Religion, education and law, have all united in 
an effort to drive this evil from America, and 
the West Indies, but investigation proves that 
it still exists, in a great degree in America, and 
thrives in Haiti. The "Obeah" of Vaudoux- 
ism, is believed to possess secret charms and 

spells which he exercises on his enemies, or for 
11 



162 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

a "consideration," upon the enemies of his pa- 
trons. He is supposed to be able to bring death 
and restore life at will, and to destroy the crops, 
or produce the "wasting away," of the victim 
selected for his practices of Black Magic. He is, 
of course, skilled in the use of subtle poisons. 
The records of criminal courts in Haiti contain 
accounts of trials, where no less than twelve 
persons have been proven to be participants in 
the sacrifice of "The Goat without horns" to 
the serpent Deity. 

"The goat without horns," is a human being: 
(usually an infant or young child.) 

Twenty years ago a girl of twelve was the 
victim; she was hung by her feet to the ceiling, 
and her throat cut. One of the witnesses con- 
fessed to having sliced a piece of flesh from the 
dead girl's hand, before the body was dissected 
and cooked, for the favored initiates of the 
order. 

All this was done by order of "Papa" and 
"Mama-Loi" to propitiate the serpent Diety. 
A man known as the "Loup-garoux" is com- 
missioned by the Vaudeux priests to procure 
victims for these sacrifices. Infants are stolen 
from the cradle, and young children from their 
homes, to be used as human offerings on Vaud- 
eaux altars. The sacrifice of human life is un- 
questionably decreasing at these carnivals and 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 163 

goats and fowls are substituted, but that it 
still occurs in Haiti cannot be doubted. 

"The Obeah man" is a continual menace to 
his neighbors and a stumbling block to progress. 

In Kingston, Jamaica, this winter of 1909, a 
man was sentenced to two years in prison for 
Obeah practices. 

In New Orleans, Louisiana, the Obeah man 
still puts his Vaudoux "spell" upon his chosen 
victim. Miss Helen Pitkin of that city has 
given a very graphic and artistic description of 
him and his rites in her novel "An Angel by 
Brevet," issued by the Lippincott's three years 
ago and Miss Violet Hauk in a novel, "The Girl 
in Question," has fully embodied the Haitien 
horrors of Vaudouxism. Until my visit to the 
Black Republic, I had supposed Miss Hauk's 
novel to be mere fiction, and fancy. 

If in the midst of such civilized centres as 
Louisiana and Jamaica, the Vaudoux evil can- 
not be eradicated, how vain the idea which is 
trying to be forced upon the public, that it has 
ceased to exist in Haiti. Driving through the 
suburbs of a small Haitien town just at early 
twilight, we heard strange, barbaric music, pro- 
ceeding from an inclosure. As this inclosure 
was formed by a dilapidated wall, we were 
curious to peep behind it, and see the music 
makers, but the American resident of the town, 



164 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

who was our companion, gravely suggested that 
we drive on. 

"These people would resent any curiosity on 
our part," he said, "in fact it would be dangerous 
to show ourselves among them at one of these 
festivities." Becoming curious, I questioned 
why; but while my questions brought forth no 
absolute assertion of the existence of the Vau- 
doux society in that town, they caused the 
American resident to display such reticence and 
nervousness, that it was substantial evidence in 
the affirmative. Compelled to reside in the 
town for an official term of years, he did not wish 
to make himself a target for the hatred of these 
people, by useless interference with their super- 
stition. That night a Catholic priest who was a 
passenger on our ship, went over to the Haitien 
town to pass the night with brother priests, 
stationed in this parish. Questioned the next 
day as to what information he had gained on 
this subject he confessed to some peculiar ex- 
periences . 

Weird music, loud chanting voices, and sounds 
of strange revels disturbed his sleep. His com- 
rades told him that it was a meeting of the 
Vaudoux worshippers practicing for a later 
rite, and that despite the combined efforts of 
church, school and state, they could not stamp 
out this evil. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 165 

I have since talked with other priests of dif- 
ferent cities of Haiti, as well as with several 
officials who have resided for periods of years 
in the Black Republic. All declared the Vau- 
doux evil a crying one, and stated their inability 
to grapple with it. The Haitien negroes are 
kind, gentle and amiable people, outside of the 
domain of religion and politics. Robberies are 
unheard of, and strangers can traverse the deep- 
est forest without receiving anything but kind- 
ness at the hands of the natives, if they attend 
strictly to their own affairs. But let it once be 
suspected that you are spying upon their 
Vaudoux ceremonies, or trying to interfere with 
their political ambitions, they do not hesitate to 
put you summarily out of existence. It is whis- 
pered that one of the leading officials of Haiti 
is a Vaudoux worshipper, and that he keeps 
1 'sacred serpents" in a temple where he goes to 
receive "inspiration and direction" at times 
when the cares of his public life press heavily 
upon him. 

In the towns where education has began to 
blaze the trail of progress, this medieval super- 
stition has lost its hold to a great extent: but in 
the vast stretches of mountain regions the, 
"Loup-garoux" is known and feared, and there 
the Vaudoux priest and priestess are supreme 
in power: and there the sacrifice of animal, fowl, 



166 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

and sometimes "the goat without horns" is 
made at the time of the great carnivals. 

To one who has passed a few days in any of 
the Haitien cities, and who has seen the awful 
conditions which universally prevail, any tale 
seems believable, which connects the people with 
ignorance and superstition. 

There are always a few to be found in each 
city and hamlet, who are working up toward 
the light, and reaching out to a better civiliza- 
tion. I met and talked with three bright faced 
intelligent young women, who were teaching at 
Aux Cayes. They informed me that there were 
nine schools in that town of six thousand people, 
besides some private schools. The teaching is 
all given in French, which is the language of the 
Island. English is taught as an accomplishment 
in the higher grades. 

These young women were excellent repre- 
sentatives of the best class of colored people, 
and seemed well fitted for the position of in- 
structors of the young; yet in an address recently 
delivered by Mr. Simon the new president of 
Haiti, he mentioned with censure, the fact that 
"ignorant men incapable of reading or writing, 
were occupying positions as teachers in some of 
the schools of Haiti." 

I asked an American Consul, a Catholic priest, 
and a school teacher, why the citizens of Haitien 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 167 

towns were not awakened to the need of cleaning 
their streets. The dishonest and rapacious 
Government, which heavily taxes its people, 
and gives them nothing in return, was named 
as the main cause; secondarily came the hope- 
less indolence of the natives. In truth, these 
causes should be reversed. No evil government 
could prevent a man of any pride from cleaning 
the garbage from his own front yard. 

H aiti has its literature. It has produced poets, 
historians and writers of no mean order. Pierre 
Faubert, Corioleau Ardouin, and one woman 
Virginie Sampeur, all have given the world verses 
worthy the name of poetry. 

But like most of the talented men and women 
of Haiti, these geniues have been mulattoes not 
pure blacks. In one hundred years the Black 
Republic has not produced a half dozen talented 
men or women of undiluted African blood. The 
fact seems significant. 

Church, mission and school, are all doing 
something toward the improvement of Haiti, 
no doubt. 

But it is a question whether their efforts are 
sufficiently strong, to save the land from ret- 
rograding back to the conditions of darkest 
Africa, if no controlling intellectual power takes 
the helm. 



168 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

A REMARKABLE KING. 

The most remarkable King who ever sat upon 
a self created throne, was King Henry I. of Haiti, 
who ruled from 1811 until his suicide thirteen 
years later. 

Henry I. had been a slave, and became a gen- 
eral in the Revolution of 1791; under the great 
and brilliant black man, Toussaint Breda, known 
as L'Ouverture (The Way of Escape), who led 
the oppressed slaves to freedom. There had 
been centuries of this oppression — ever since 
1509, when the first slaves landed. History 
tells us that upon the arrival of these cargoes of 
"live stock" the merchants sometimes made an 
offer for the whole and then retailed them out, 
should their offer be accepted. At other times 
the master, or supercargo of the vessel, had them 
sold at public auction, or disposed of a part, 
and carried the remainder to another market. 
These marchants who dealt principally in this 
commodity used to provide themselves with a 
long room, for the reception of these poor crea- 
tures, where they were placed altogether, like 
so many horses or mules, the floor being littered 
down with trash. They were fed twice a day 
and driven to water like a herd of cattle morning 
and night. 

They were branded by hot irons, with the 




Haiti. — Market at Jacmel. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 169 

initials of their owners, and for refusal to work, 
laziness, a pretense of illness, an attempt to run 
away, or other misdemeanors, they were sub- 
jected to many violent and cruel punishments. 

Now the spirit of the French Revolution was 
in the air, and they realized that they were 
500,000 strong, and they united in a supreme 
effort to drive the French from Haiti. If their 
methods were the methods of the Barbarian 
from darkest Africa, can we wonder? What 
example had been given them by their Christian 
captors, to instill the new commandment, 
"Love one another" into their hearts? Hor- 
rible massacres and wholesale butchery were the 
"war tactics" of LeClerc and Rochambeau, the 
French leaders; and Dessaline and "Chistophe," 
the black generals sent a deluge of blood through 
the beautiful valleys of Haiti. 

In 1804 the French were all massacred or 
driven from the Island; and in 1811, Christophe, 
the mulatto general, proclaimed himself Em- 
peror, and was crowned Henry I. of Haiti. 
History tells this of the black King. 

Christophe Henry L, King of Haiti, was born 
a slave in that Island of the West Indies, from 
which he takes his name, and was still a slave in 
San Domingo in the year 1791. The early 
friend and faithful adherent of Toussaint, he 
bore a considerable resemblance to him in char- 



170 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

acter. His military talents were very respect- 
able, and his courage unshaken; his disposition, 
until spoiled by power, humane and benevolent. 
In the exercise of all the social virtues he has 
been eminently distinguished; he was a good 
husband, a good father, a steady friend, and 
strict in the observance of all the duties of re- 
ligion and morality. Contrary to the common 
custom among his black countrymen, he at- 
tached himself in early life to one woman, whom 
he never forsook, and that woman, in 1811, was 
Queen of Haiti, beloved by all ranks and con- 
ditions. Gifted with strong natural talents, he 
soon acquired the habit both of speaking and 
writing well. His color and features were com- 
pletely Negro; but his countenance was repre- 
sented as very intelligent, agreeable and ex- 
pressive. Christophe possessed the north side of 
the French part of Haiti. He was crowned on 
the 2nd of June, 1811. He altered the name of 
his Capital from Cape Francois to Cape Henry. 
He began to build a palace which was to be in 
the center of the fort, upon which neither skill, 
nor labor, nor expense, was spared to render it 
impregnable. He had about 10,000 troops all 
Negroes. This amazing undertaking, it has 
been said would have taxed the courage and re- 
sources of the greatest monarch in civilization; 
yet it was accomplished by a half savage, self 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 171 

made king, only recently a slave. All the ma- 
terials for constructing the fort and palace were 
brought from the forests; the architects and 
master builders were brought from foreign 
lands. 

"Sans Souci," as this structure was called, is 
declared to be the most wonderful architectural 
creation south of Cuba. This palace and fort 
can be seen at a distance of 20 miles from the sea, 
covering the lofty mountain La Ferriere, near 
Cape Haiti. 

King Henry had nine royal palaces constructed 
and eight chateaux. He proclaimed his consort 
a Queen, his children princes of the blood, and 
had a long list of dukes, counts and barons and 
chevaliers, all children of negro slaves. 

The reign of this black king would make a 
wonderful setting for a comic opera, and it oc- 
curred at so recent a date, that all necessary 
material could be produced with authentic 
incidents. 

King Henry built himself a tomb in the center 
of his castle, a climb of two hours through heavily 
wooded hills, from the palace where he shot him- 
self, and up the steep slope his body was carried 
and left in its lonely sepulchre. The castle is 
said to contain 300 cannon; every one had to be 
hauled up the mountain by gangs of men; and 
many of them died from exhaustion and from 



172 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

the King's cruelties; for with his "royal" state 
came royal tyranny and love of power. 

Some very remarkable letters are on exhibition 
which passed between the French Government 
and King Henry. The Island of Haiti was so 
fertile, and the plantations left by the massa- 
cred and exiled French so fruitful, that King 
Henry accumulated treasure to the amount of 
thirty million dollars, which was stored in his 
treasure vault in the castle of the fort. 

The French, after a period of years, in the 
reign of Louis XVI 1 1, began to concoct schemes 
to gain possession of the Island. Most diplo- 
matic and specious pretexts were offered, for 
restoring slavery in Haiti and making King 
Henry a general over all the troops. In reply to 
this offer, "the Grand Council of the Haitien 
Nation" wrote a lengthy letter to the King, from 
which the following extracts are taken: 



ADDRESS TO THE KING. 

"Sire: 

In the annals of the world no example can be 
found of an overture for peace, accompanied by 
such frightful and disgraceful circumstances as 
that made by the French General, Lavaysse, in 
the name and as the agent of his Majesty, Louis 
XVIII. And to whom does this vile agent dare 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 173 

to address this declaration of the atrocious in- 
tentions of his government? To your Majesty, 
the conqueror of the French, the defender of 
liberty and independence; to you, Sire, who have 
devoted your whole life to the maintenance and 
defense of the indestructible and eternal rights 
of men; to your Majesty, who has always taken, 
as the rule of your conduct and actions, the honor 
and glory of the Haitien people. He dares to 
propose to you to descend from a throne where 
you were placed by the love and gratitude of 
your fellow-citizens. Oh! extravagance, and 
insolence, and infamy! He dares to suspect 
your great soul of such an enormous perfidy! 
To whom do they dare to speak of masters and 
of slaves? To us— to a free and independent 
people, to warriors covered with noble wounds 
received in the field of honor! 

Barbarians! They think us unworthy of the 
blessings of liberty and independence. They 
think that we are not capable of sublime senti- 
ments, or of those generous impulses which form 
heroes. 

But before any Frenchman gains a footing 
here, let Haiti become a vast desert, let our 
towns, our manufacturers, our dwellings be- 
come a prey to the flames. Let each of us 
multiply his force, redouble his energy and his 
courage, in imolating to our first jury thousands 



174 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

of these tigers who are alienated from our blood! 
Let Haiti present nothing but a heap of ruins! 
Let terrified countenances meet nothing but 
sights of death, destruction, and vengeance! 
Let posterity have to say, on beholding these 
ruins: 'Here lived a free, a generous people; 
tyrants wanted to strip them of their liberty, 
but they resolved to perish sooner than part 
with it.' " King Henry, in answer to the ad- 
dress of the Grand Council of the Haitian Nation, 
made the following reply: 

"Haitians! Your sentiments, your generous 
resolution are worthy of us; Your King shall 
always be worthy of you. Our indignation is 
at its height! Let Haiti, from this moment, be 
only one vast camp; let us prepare to combat 
those tyrants who threaten us with chains, 
slavery and death. Haitians, the whole world 
has its eyes fixed upon us: our conduct must 
confound our culminators, and justify the 
opinion which philanthropists have formed of 
us. Let us rally; let us have but one and the 
same wish, that of exterminating our tyrants. 
On the unanimous co-operation of our union, of 
our efforts, will depend the prompt success of 
our cause. Let us exhibit to posterity a great 
example of courage; let us combat with glory and 
be effaced from the rank of nations rather than 
romance, liberty and independence." 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 175 

King Henry ordered his private secretary to 
answer the letter from France article by article. 
The answer forms an octavo pamphlet of twenty- 
eight pages, full of energy and information, and 
does great credit to its author, who bears the 
title, Chevalier de Preseaux. 

All of these letters are most astonishing in 
their elegance of diction and power of reasoning, 
when we remember they were composed by men 
who had but recently been slaves. But how 
discouraging to contemplate the condition of 
Haiti today, almost 100 years since these letters 
were written. Superstition, cruelty, sloth, filth, 
are the qualities which stand unpleasantly pre- 
eminent among the Haitians of today. And 
those noble exceptions who rise in an effort to 
save their land, are trodden under the feet of 
ignorance and greed. 



176 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



SANTO DOMINGO. 

In a curious book, called "The Wanderings of 
a Soul," I once read the supposed narrative of a 
disembodied Spirit, which had worked its way 
up from regions of darkness (whither its sins 
had consigned it) to realms of hope, and finally 
to higher heavens of Light. This story occurred 
to me, as we awoke one morning after a week in 
Haitien towns and found ourselves entering the 
harbor of Santo Domingo. 

Our minds, our eyes, our nostrils, had been 
filled with the repulvise and the offensive for 
so many days that we had fallen asleep in our 
berths, feeling we were souls lost in regions of 
shade; and now, behold, we had risen in a night, 
to realms of hope. 

The pier was crowded with a decently dressed 
and orderly throng of people; rows of well-built 
warehouses were directly in the foreground, sug- 
gesting thrift and prosperity: neat vistas of un- 
encumbered streets led back to picturesque ruins 
of historical structures; ruins of the Columbus 
era. 

The air was fresh and dry; the winds active 
and exhilirating; the sun blazing with tropical 
vigor. 











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SAILING SUNNY SEAS 177 

The throng at the pier seemed to be there 
for a purpose; for some object. There was no- 
where visible the spirit of the loafer and mendi- 
cant; no suggestion of the idle barbarian which 
had been everywhere prevalent in Haiti. 

"Surely we have awakened in another world," 
we said. "This cannot be a part of the Island 
of Haiti, and only a day distant from the Black 
Republic?" 

But so its was. 

The Island of Haiti is four hundred miles long 
and one hundred and thirty-five wide, in some 
parts. It lies between the Atlantic Ocean and 
the Caribbean Sea, and it is divided into two 
Republics, one-third Haitien, the remainder 
known as Santo Domingo. 

Columbus discovered this island of Haiti on 
his first voyage, December 6, 1492. He es- 
tablished the city of Santo Domingo on his 
second visit in 1493. 

His "brave followers" exterminated the native 
Arawaks in a brief period of time. The men 
were massacred wholesale, while the younger 
women were kept to bear children, and become 
slaves to the conquering Spaniards. The Indian 
type of face is still to be seen in some of the in- 
habitants of Santo Domingo today; descendents 
of those unhappy women, who lived to see their 
tribes exterminated and to suffer every possible 

12 



178 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

cruelty and indignity at the hands of the "vali- 
ant" Spaniards. Most of the butchery was done 
in the name of religion. To convert and save the 
poor Arawaks was the burning desire of the in- 
vading Spaniard. Rather than have them 
live "unconverted" they butchered them. But 
before they were murdered they were always 
baptized. 

In 1505 negro slaves were brought to Haiti. 

In his delightful book, "The Cradle of the 
Deep," Sir Francis Treves says of this event: 

"It was the squalid beginning of a terrible 
end; these miserable beings could hardly crawl 
out of the boats where they had been cramped 
for weeks in a putrid hold; their bodies were in- 
dented by the marks of the planks; huddled 
together like frightened animals, they whisked 
flies from the sores left by the lash of the whip. 
Some died; all were famishing for food; all were 
wide eyed with alarm." 

Can we wonder that the descendants of these 
wretched beings, who own the Island of Haiti 
today, are incompetent to cope with existing 
conditions?" 

Yet Santo Domingo never fell utterly into 
the hands of these people as did the "Black 
Republic" of Haiti. 

The influence of the conquering Spaniard has 
always held the supremacy. The city boasts of 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 179 

families where the Spanish blood has been kept 
unadulterated through all these centuries, but 
such families are few indeed. The black man 
is not obtrusively evident; but the yellow and 
the brown men are everywhere, and in all classes 
of society. 

Standing on the deck of our ship we were 
shown the very Silk Wood Tree to which Colum- 
bus tied his boat, and close to the wharf rose the 
stately ruin of Castle Colon, the magnificent 
chateau and statehouse built by Diego, the son 
of Christopher Columbus, in 1509. 

Walking among these ruins afterward, the 
necessity for some governmental provision for 
their preservation impressed us. They should 
be saved from further decay; they should 
be made sanitary and inviting, instead of 
foul and fearsome; they should have a 
caretaker, whose duty it is to show travelers 
about and to explain the history of this oldest 
structure, built on the shores of the New World. 

This is a duty which Santo Domingo owes to 
the whole world and to its own pride. 

Sir Francis Treve speaks of Santo Domingo 
as "ill smelling and unsanitary." 

We did not find it so. We found thrift, re- 
pair, progress, everywhere in the city of ancient 
lineage. The contrast between it and the 
"Black Republic" was as great as between 



180 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Southern Spain and Gibraltar, separated as they 
are by a half hours' drive, and centuries of 
progress. Yet since Sir Francis wrote his book, 
the influence of America has been brought to 
bear on Santo Domingo. 

We do not wish to flap noisily the wings of 
our American Eagle; or to loudly boast; but 
Justice and Truth demand that due credit be 
given where it belongs. 

Justice and Truth demand, also, that large 
credit be given the officials and the people of 
Santo Domingo for their great and beautiful 
efforts, constantly increasing, to keep the Re- 
public abreast of the times and in step with the 
march of progress. Santo Domingo has been 
torn with bloody wars, and bruised by bad rulers. 
Two years ago it became so deeply involved in 
debt that it was necessary to appoint a wise con- 
troller of its finances. 

This position fell to the United States, and 
wonderful results ensued. Every month the 
American Collector of Ports sends $100,000 to be 
applied on the national debt, yet despite this 
drain the income of the Republic is greater than 
ever before in its history. It is therefore able to 
mend its roads, to repair its bridges, and to 
clean and improve its streets. All this is being 
done and by the Republic itself. That American 
influence and example play their part goes 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 181 

without saying. It seems unfortunate that any 
Santo Domingan can hesitate in acknowledging 
its debt of gratitude to America. Santo Domin- 
go is filled with a spirit of hospitality. If it pos- 
sessed a modern hotel, conducted on American 
ideas of comfort and hygiene, the place would 
make an ideal Winter resort for Americans. 

The first gold sent to Spain from the new 
continent came from Santo Domingo. There is 
every reason to suppose that its mountains are 
rich in undug gold. 

It was our good fortune to witness a Flower 
Fiesta in Santo Domingo. Oddly enough, just 
a year previous to the day, we were present at 
a similar festivity in Honolulu, where five na- 
tions were represented. A month previous to 
that we had seen the great annual Rose Carnival 
at Pasedena, California. While both of these 
occasions were more elaborate, and the proces- 
sion of greater length, there was a peculiarity 
uncommercial spirit pervading. the Santo Do- 
mingo Fiesta, which lent it a more poetic charm. 

Five national poets, in truth, read poems to 
the "Queen of the West Indian Carnival." The 
happy young woman bears the wonderful name 
of "Aurora Ponce de Leon" and possesses the 
sumptuous Creole beauty which belongs to such 
a name. She is said to be a direct descendant 
of Santo Domingo's first famous Governor. 



180 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Americo Lugo was the 'poet laureate of the 
occasion and is chief of the national poets on the 
island. It was my pleasure to meet the young 
man, and to be presented with copies of two of 
his books, and with a MS. copy of his prose poem 
dedicated to the Queen of the Fiesta, "Aurora 
First." 

Arturo Pellerano Alfau is the name of the 
editor and proprietor of the only daily paper 
published on the island of Santo Domingo. I 
met him at the home of the very delightful 
American Minister, Mr. MacCreery. 

Mr. Alfau is a native of Santo Domingo, and 
a man of strikingly handsome and impressive 
personality. He enters heart and soul into 
whatever tends toward the best interests of his 
people and the best development of his land. 
There was something touching and pathetic in 
the pleasure and gratification displayed by this 
big, strong man at hearing words of sincere 
praise from strangers regarding his country. 

The attitude of many Santo Domingans 
toward the United States partakes of the mingled 
hatred and jealousy which has characterized 
the feeling of every country assisted or domi- 
nated by us in the past. Yet always the broader 
and more enlightened and consequently more 
just, citizens of each country are free from 
these ignoble jealousies. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 183 

In Mr. Alfau's paper, "The Daily List," re- 
cently appeared the following editorial: 

"The famous Monroe Doctrine is the firmest 
base on which the powerful Republic of America 
rests. It guarantees that the United States 
shall not interfere with European affairs or enter 
into offensive or defensive wars of other coun- 
tries. 

"It also refers to the duty and right of the 
United States to forbid European powers any 
claims on American soil which would be a menace 
to the nation. 

"This doctrine is often attacked without being 
understood, but it certainly insures peace, order 
and progress, the stability of the Government 
and international public duties. Understood in 
this way, we have nothing to fear from the 
people or the Government of the United States." 

The color lines are so faintly drawn in Santo 
Domingo as to be scarcely perceptible. While 
the pure Castilian still exists, he is not sufficiently 
numerous to form an exclusive class. 

The President of the Republic is a mulatto, 
and men and women who look white prove to 
be "near white" frequently by unhesitatingly 
marrying into families of pronouncedly African 
extraction. 

In the Flower Fiesta beautiful girls who were 
distinctly Spanish in their slender grace sat 



184 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

side by side with those whose features and color 
proclaimed the darker blood. 

In one family is oftimes found the delicate 
Castilian type, while in another member, a 
brother or a sister, the clearly indicated descend- 
ant of Ethiopia is seen. 

But those distinctions cause no class prej- 
udices in Santo Domingo. The majority rules, 
and is respected. This majority is the color 
element. 

One of the most tactful and well qualified 
men for a Foreign Ministership is our American 
representative, Mr. MacCreery, in Santo Do- 
mingo. It seems a misfortune to the country 
as well as to womankind that such a man should 
be a bachelor. With a wife as gracious and 
diplomatic as himself, and with a good Ameri- 
can hotel, Santo Domingo might become a 
center for fashionable America in its migrating 
season. It possesses every desirable quality. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 185 



PORTO RICO. 

When our good little trading cruiser reached 
Ponce, on the Island of Porto Rico, one of our 
pleasant table companions, the corporation at- 
torney of Denver, Colo., taking a winter's voy- 
age for pleasure, a young merchant traveling for 
business purposes, and Himself and myself, left 
our pleasant associates and our cramped quar- 
ters, for a motor-trip across the mountains. 
This journey leads over the admirable old 
Spanish military drive, and ends in San Juan, 
a distance of 84 miles. 

We obtained a very good machine and excel- 
lent chauffeur, and leaving Ponce at 9 a.m., we 
wound up and around and down and about the 
mountains, over what might well be called the 
spiral driveway, arriving at San Juan between 
4 and 5 in the afternoon. 

The greater part of the day was clear and 
glowing, and the views obtained as we rose from 
height to height, was incomparably beautiful. 
Even when the clouds, jealous of the sun's de- 
votion, clasped the mountain peaks in close 
embrace and bathed their brows in starry tears, 
the effect was splendid in the extreme. Higher 
and higher we climbed, exhilirated with the 



186 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

panorama and gratified with the consciousness 
that no starving beast was being hurt in wind or 
limb by our ascent; but one thought did obtrude 
itself as we rolled over the perfection of road- 
ways, as smooth as a suburban boulevard, in 
that we were enjoying the result of slave labor. 

This Military Road, like all the roads in Ja- 
maica, was built by the slaves. Their descend- 
ants, however, are so greatly in the majority 
in the Islands, that the main benefit of that 
thankless toil falls where it belongs. 

The magnificence of the scenery in our new 
territory in Porto Rico, was a surprise and an 
inspiration to the four Americans who spiraled 
about those lofty mountains — our veritable 
Alps — clad in tropical verdure, instead of gleam- 
ing snows. Range after range, peak after peak 
became visible from the highest altitude of almost 
4,000 feet, and once, far in the distance we caught 
a glimpse of the peacock blue sea, between the 
mountain ranges. 

Down in the valleys for miles stretched, what, 
to an imperfect vision would have seemed a foam 
capped river with waterfalls here and there; 
but it was something far more prosaic, however 
unusual. It was miles of tobacco plantations, 
covered with cheese cloth to protect the plant, 
from insects and a too hot sun; a curious sight 
indeed, framed on either side as these plantations 
were, by lofty mountains of shaded greens. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 187 

Again we saw what at first resembled a 
mountain on fire, save that no smoke rose from 
the vast space of red flame. Nearer approach 
showed us that it was a whole grove of stately 
trees in gorgeous blossom; the well named 
"Flamboyan" tree. Farther on we came to a 
portion of the road whereon for a fourth of a 
mile some woodland fairy, had spread a crimson 
carpet for our spinning wheels; the fallen blos- 
soms of this tropical tree. 

Inexplicably beautiful notes of strange new 
birds dropped from hidden recesses of the forest, 
like precious ore resolved into liquid sound. 

And what monstrous iniquity, what devilish 
cruelty, lurks in the human mind that could con- 
ceive the hunting and the caging of these little 
feathered atoms of the voice of God! 

Yet such creatures exist. 

San Juan, the city, was something of a dis- 
appointment to us. Every West Indian town 
is beautiful seen from the harbor; not all are 
beautiful, closely approached. 

San Juan seems to squat itself beside the sea, 
like an indolent Creole. It lacks distinction, 
but it assures you that it is not unacquainted 
with broom and bath. 

There are not quite so many black people 
as you are accustomed to seeing in the Islands 
left behind; but the Spaniard is everywhere in 
evidence, as he has the right to be. 



188 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Exclusive Spanish families still rule the social 
world in San Juan, and form a circle to which it 
is not always possible for the rich American to 
purchase an open sesame. 

Yet much social gaiety exists in the Ameri- 
can colony of San Juan, and everywhere, in all 
avenues and departments of life, the American 
is forging his way. 

The Americans have, in eight years time, built 
just twice the length of good roads built by the 
Spaniards in 400 years (and built them without 
slaves). 

When Porto Rico came under American con- 
trol it had 400 schools. Now it has 1,700. The 
schools are scattered all through the rural re- 
gions, and every few miles as we drove over the 
mountains, we came upon the neat building with 
its waving American banner, which spoke of the 
wonderful future awaiting this colony in the 
next half century. There is a society for the 
Protection of Animals in San Juan, but it lacks 
vitality, force and money. Wherever the Latin 
blood is found, there too is found appalling in- 
difference to the suffering of animals and fowls. 
The crack of the whip and the clatter of horses' 
feet driven mercilessly over the hot pavements 
under a burning sun marred the rest and relaxa- 
tion I had hoped to find in San Juan before 
joining "The President," and proceeding on our 
cruise. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 189 

I repeatedly begged one driver I had engaged 
to put up his whip, and let his willing horse trot 
along unmolested. I had engaged him by the 
hour, and I was in no haste. After the third 
sullen defiance of my request, I reached over and 
administered a sharp slap on the fellow's cheek. 
For the remainder of the drive his horse was free 
from the lashing of the whip. Sometimes it re- 
quires an object lesson to teach certain types of 
mind that you are in earnest in your determina- 
tion to protect animals against more brutal 
animals. 

There are no women's clubs in San Juan; but 
in Ponce a thriving club exists. The larger city 
keeps closely to its Spanish traditions; the 
smaller one is more inclined to accept American 
innovations. 

Spanish is still the language of the Island. 
The grown people are too old, the children are 
too young, after eight years only of American 
rule, to make the change of tongue emphatic. 
But all the school children are learning English, 
and in a quarter of a century Porto Rico will be 
an American territory in sound, as well as in its 
visible thrift and cleanliness. There is crying 
need now of an American hotel where travelers 
may find real comfort. 

The seeker of the beautiful finds his ideal of 
restful homes in the suburban residences about 



190 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

San Juan: homes made especially appealing to 
refined tastes, and offering every inducement to 
the tourist to leave further journeyings for 
another season, and to remain in Porto Rico. 

More attractive to me were these homes, and 
the American schools, and the great chains of 
good roads built by the United States, than the 
grim forts with their appalling dungeons and 
incredibly cruel catacombs. These monuments 
left to commemorate here — as in almost every 
city in Europe — the demoniacal spirit of revenge 
which dominated the Spaniards for centuries, 
speak loudly today in their grim silence, of the 
mighty progress of the human race toward 
higher standards. 

What nation on the face of earth today would 
carefully plan and boldly construct, prisons 
where no light or sound could penetrate, and 
where the wretched inmate would be forced to 
crouch with his chin upon his breast, an iron bar 
across his body, while he slowly starved to 
death ? 

Yet in Fort Cristobal at San Juan, six such 
death traps were constructed by order of the 
Spanish Government at the end of the 18th 
century — not two hundred years ago. 

These dungeons were employed to "punish" 
political enemies and traitors, and foes to the 
accepted creed of Spain. Out from the dark 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 191 

door that leads to these awful hell holes, one 
word seems to blaze forth in letters of living 
light to shine over our present era 
That word is 
"Progress." 



193 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



ST. THOMAS. 

At the Island of St. Thomas, a night distant 
from San Juan, we parted company with our 
dear little ship "The President," and said good- 
bye to the fine body of men composing its officers 
and crew. Strong, virile, manly men, every one 
of them, from the handsome young captain with 
rosy cheeks and turquoise eyes and snow white 
hair, down to the willing, cheerful, accommodat- 
ing stewards. We had given them a difficult 
task, for which they had not been prepared; 
but many a proud ship sails the high seas for no 
other purpose than to cater to the comfort of 
pleasure seekers, which does not treat its pas- 
sengers so royally as we were all treated by the 
valiant little merchant cruiser of the Caribbean 
coast. 

"Vive Le President" of the Hamburg Ameri- 
can line! 

With the memory of many ship tables in mind, 
I recall but one company of voyaging comrades 
to be compared with the little circle which com- 
prised our table on The President. 

There was a member of Parliament from 
Canada, traveling for pleasure and education, 
and to escape the rigors of his native land in 




St. Thq.mas. — Madame Minecke. 




St. Thomas. — Harbor View From Ma Folie. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 193 

winter; there was a "gentleman from In- 
diana," retired from business, and rinding dis- 
traction and recreation; there was a young 
man from Boston, seeking health after a long 
illness; there was a corporation attorney from 
Denver, adding to a long list of journeys and 
travel experiences, and there was a Catholic 
priest, also seeking health. Himself and my- 
self completed the circle. I felt always as if I 
were hostess at a dinner party; and our meal 
hours were full of pleasant conversation and 
repartee. 

After dinner a few of us frequently gathered 
at the table of the tiny cabin, and indulged 
in the distraction of cards: an accomplishment 
so recently acquired by myself, that my pride 
in being able to tell the King from the Jack, was 
only equaled by the despair of my partners 
when I failed to recognize a Right and Left 
Bower as valuable possessions in ' ' Five Hundred, ' ' 
the one game I had learned. 

But at St. Thomas, this pleasant circle dis- 
persed, after thirteen delightful days and nights 
of cruising. 

On the morning we left Kingston, Himself had 
shown me a little blank book, and with a sig- 
nificant look he had said: "In this book we are 
to record in Black Ink, every complaint made 
on this cruise. Half the book belongs to you; 

13 



194 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

half to me; and neither is to see what the other 
has recorded until the end of the voyage. It is 
to be a hard and trying experience, and if we 
have the Black Entries in this book in mind, it 
may cause us to be philosophical and use self 
restraint." Shortly afterward when I remarked 
that I wished the captain would hurry out of 
the harbor, as it was getting hotter every minute, 
I was shown the blank book, and Himself sat 
down to make the first entry. 

But it did not appear again during our thir- 
teen days on "The President," which fact proves 
that we both behaved in an exemplary manner. 

Awakening in the morning and finding our- 
selves in the harbor of St. Thomas, with her 
chief city, Charlotte Amalie, directly in the fore- 
ground, we exclaimed with delight at the beauti- 
ful prospect which met our eyes. 

The harbor at St. Thomas is spacious and in- 
viting, and its capitol city looks with its freshly 
painted white houses, red roofs and green foliage, 
like a bouquet of flowers from a Dutch garden, 
set in a big bowl of water. 

Of St. Thomas we had heard much, and it was 
with interest we contemplated our four days 
sojourn there, before going on to the turning 
point at St. Kitts. 

Now this chronicle of sailing in sunny seas 
claims to be nothing but personal experiences, 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 195 

impressions and adventures, and what I am 
about to say should not, therefore, influence 
any reader contemplating a similar cruise, from 
visiting St. Thomas and remaining two weeks, 
if he has so planned. 

One of our ship acquaintances, met again later 
on the journey, assured me he had found St. 
Thomas delightful from every point of view, 
and much preferable to San Juan. 

But my four days in that little Dutch bowl 
set in a circle of hills, are one memory of mental 
misery and physical discomfort. We had brought 
all our baggage ashore with the intention of re- 
arranging and repacking, before setting forth 
anew. I am not one of those admirable women 
who can travel around the world with a dress 
suit case and a chatelain bag. Trunks cling 
to me and stick like burrs, when I try to shake 
them off. So I do not try. Decent and frequent 
changes of apparel I find as necessary en voyage 
as at home. And the more than 200 lbs. avoir- 
dupois which Himself carries about the earth, 
demands vehicles for masculine garments, as 
well. However we may determine to reduce 
our belongings to the smallest possible compass, 
when we set forth on a journey, we invariably 
find ourselves wrestling with many trunks, and 
buying baskets and straps in addition, before we 
have proceeded half way to our goal. Now 



196 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

although we had determined to leave the "Ber- 
muda Arc" untouched until we arrived at this 
point of our wanderings, here we were in St. 
Thomas, both fortunately agreeing upon the 
necessity to open and repack all our baggage. 

So we were delighted when we found ourselves 
in a commodious room with space and to spare 
for our belongings. 

That moment of delight was my last. There 
is room to move about on an Arizona desert, but 
that does not mean repose or pleasure. Our 
room lacked every possible convenience. There 
seemed to be miles of ugly wall space, but no 
bureau, no dresser, no hooks, no wardrobe, no 
clothes press, for garments. The beds were 
commodious, but they contained no comfort; 
the long French windows opened on a stony 
paved street which glared back at the gazer 
with an uncomfortable stare, and thundered a 
deafening protest to every passing cart. Mobs 
of children in varied colors shrieked their declara- 
tion of independence of parental control all day 
long, and sailors who had freely sampled Santa 
Cruz rum, made riotous love to dusky maids, 
from sunset to dawn. 

Born without "nerves," those dreaded foes to 
happiness seemed to develop in the St. Thomas 
atmosphere, so that the spotless cleanliness of 
the town, the interesting shops, the great beauty 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 197 

of the scenery, all failed to give me pleasure. 
Only one impulse dominated me — to get away 
from St. Thomas. 

Unwilling to leave so picturesque a place with 
only memories of mean annoyances, we resolved 
upon heroic efforts to arouse ourselves to ad- 
miration. High up on one of the mountains we 
were told of a spot known as "Ma Folie," from 
which was obtained a very magnificent view of 
the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, with 
all the groups of the Lower Antilles and the 
Virgin Islands spread out to the view of the ad- 
venturous climber. 

Only mules, goats and pedestrians made the 
ascent, and the path was long, rough and steep. 
But the following morning, we two, reinforced 
by a brave third, crept our way by the light of 
matches, from the dark hotel, down into the dim 
street, and forged toward the trail to Ma Folie. 

Up a long flight of brick-laid stairs to the 
north, out through a winding roadway rapidly 
narrowing to a path, we began the ascent, ac- 
companied by the increasing vanguard and 
heralds of the advancing morning. 

Darkness changed to lustrous shadow; the 
shadow bloomed into opal-tinted dusk; the dusk 
removed her seven veils one by one as we toiled 
up and up, over rough and ever rougher paths, 
panting for breath and pausing to renew our 
forces, until, lo, as we attained the final summit. 



198 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

dusk tossed aside her last veil and revealed the 
splendid face of Dawn! 

And now it was no longer "Ma Folie" whereon 
we stood, but "Ma Gloire." As if to reward us 
for our long hour of climbing, nature provided 
us with a sunrise of unusual magnificence. 

Castles, ships, forts and faces, were all pic- 
tured in radiant clouds, through which the 
tropical sun forced its way, blazing in gold 
armor and shining with spears of light. 

Below us, bright with riotous greens and blues, 
two mighty seas were spread, and a hundred 
islands reached up fair faces to be admired, and 
there were ships in the harbors, and at our feet 
far below lay the red roofs and white walls of 
Charlotte Amalie, the Capital of St. Thomas. 
At the left on a summit below us, "Blue Beard's 
Castle," of doubtful history, stood outlined 
against the blue sky, and at the right the more 
ancient and authentic ruin of "Black Beard's 
Castle," a structure reared in the days of the 
Buccaneers, by one Edward Touch, of Spanish 
Town, Jamaica, as villianous a cutthroat and 
pirate as ever sailed fair seas. And so, after 
all, we had risen above the petty disappointment 
and irritating annoyances of St. Thomas, and 
climbed to a pleasurable memory. 

Of the lame sinews, and weary limbs after- 
ward, let us be silent. The dance was worth 
the piper's bill. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 199 



ST. CROIX AND ST. KITTS. 

Something like forty miles south of St. 
Thomas lies the little island of St. Croix (called 
too, Santa Cruz) and famous for its rum. 

The guide book says it is also famous for a 
delightful climate, but a hotter place than we 
found it, could not be reached this side of the 
grave, I am sure. 

The Island is only nineteen miles by five and 
Himself remarked that it was evidently in- 
tended as a "Golf Course," for St. Thomas. 

The only memorable thing we saw in St. 
Croix was an old cement stairway, which Him- 
self kodacked. Its lines were graceful in the 
extreme and it lent a dignity and charm to an 
otherwise glaringly, commonplace street. 

Some of our passengers (three men) took a 
fifteen mile drive in St. Croix and reported the 
scenery as pleasing, but devoid of the variety 
found in mountainous islands. Their condition 
on their return indicated the strength of the 
native rum which they informed us they had 
sampled. The information was superfluous. 

Despite its diminutive size, St. Croix has re- 
ceived marked attention from earthquakes, cy- 
clones and tidal waves in times past. 



200 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

And it feels its importance accordingly. 

At St. Kitts we had planned to take the 
"Sobo" the Halifax steamer which makes Ber- 
muda on its return from the West Indies. Our 
boat reached St. Kitts in the early morning; 
and Himself hurried out to obtain news of the 
Sobo before I was fully awake. But my awak- 
ening came with sudden force, when he returned 
after a few moments to tell me the startling 
news; the Sobo had gone and what was more 
distressing, neither the Sobo or any other boat 
from the West Indies would be allowed to land 
passengers at Bermuda again this season owing 
to strict quarantine laws. There had been a 
few cases of yellow fever in the Barbadoes, and, 
although the Sobo was free from infection as an 
iceberg from moths, it could not carry passen- 
gers to Bermuda because it had paused at Bar- 
badoes. 

Himself who had set forth on this cruise with 
the noble resolution to make the best of what- 
ever occurred, fell completely from grace on this 
occasion and I'm quite sure the little "Blank 
Book" went overboard. I never heard it men- 
tioned again. It was not large enough, he knew, 
to contain all the black marks he had invited. 

As our ship remained only an hour in the har- 
bor, we were obliged to go ashore at once, with 
all our baggage and to settle ourselves some- 




St. Kitts.— Group of Natives. 




St. Kitts. — Watching the Pelicans Diving. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 201 

where before we undertook to decide our future 
plans. Realizing that another experience of 
such discomfort as awaited me at St. Thomas 
would be no more likely to occur again so soon, 
than two lightning strokes on one tree, I set 
forth bravely if not blithely to hunt a resting 
place, while Himself interviewed steamship offi- 
cials in Basseterre. 

I found two hopeful looking rooms inside a 
building of most unattractive exterior. One 
room opened on the sea, the other on a green 
garden and there were hooks and dresses and 
wardrobes to heal a feminine heart, which had 
been torn by their absence in St. Thomas. And 
when Himself and our trunks arrived, the rest- 
ful unbeautiful rooms soon began to wear that 
feeling of "homeiness" which we could not for 
one moment conjure into the desolation and 
disorder and riot of our St. Thomas apartment. 

Walls not only have ears, but walls ha /e tem- 
perament, dispositions and vibrations, which 
help to make or destroy a home. The outside 
of our "Sea Shore Hotel" at St. Kitts, mis- 
represented its cozy and comfortable interior, 
as a bad complexion and ungroomed hair may 
misrepresent a sweet natured kind hearted 
woman. The Sea Side Hotel, by all odds the 
best place in St. Kitts, for a traveler to find cool 
breezes and peaceful rest, needs a "beauty 



202 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

doctor" to make it presentable to the eye. So 
in truth does all St. Kitts. Its streets are clean 
and its odors are not unpleasant; but its houses 
all seem freckled and uncombed, and give the 
village a look of dilapidation and despondency. 

Basseterre lies at the foot of Monkey Hill, 
between Brimstone Hill and Mount Misery. 
Both are extinct volcanoes. Their heads wrap- 
ped in shawls of clouds. 

They suggest grim giants, brooding over past 
deeds of violence; the spirits of old pirates and 
buccaneers, doomed to sit in solitude and see 
fair ships sail their seas, unmolested with their 
goodly cargoes. 

As yet again they seem like the demon spirits 
of earthquake, eruption and tidal wave, only 
waiting their chosen opportunity to again 
destroy the proud works of man. 

St. Kitts has suffered little in comparison with 
many of the West Indian Islands from the cata- 
clysms of Nature, yet she has known disaster 
from earthquakes in the past, and may know it 
again. 

The fallen city, like the fallen woman, finds 
absolute immunity from her old weakness, 
difficult to attain. 

My first, and I trust, last, earthquake ex- 
perience, was destined to befall me at St. Kitts. 
Wakened suddenly from a sound and dreamless 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 203 

slumber at a quarter before 1 a. m. on March 
8, 1909, by the shuddering of my bed, I was 
instantly conscious that I was experiencing an 
earthquake. The bed seemed to be in the grasp 
of some giant, who was shaking it from side to 
side. I ran across the hall to die, if die I must, 
with Himself. The vibrations ceased before I 
reached the door, and then I was prepared to 
meet skeptical laughter when I should make my 
assertion that an earthquake had occurred. In- 
stead I found Himself seeking me — to announce 
the fact that he had been tossed from sleep to 
startled wakefulness by the pitching of his bed, 
which faced the west. Securing my bag of 
toilet articles and an ulster, so I could escape in 
the streets with decorum if the second scare came 
I remained awake with Himself an hour or two, 
watching for the disaster which did not come. 

In the morning assured by the servants that 
they had felt no earthquake, we began to wonder 
if we were twin victims of an hallucination; but 
the nervous condition of our good landlady at 
the breakfast table convinced us of the reality 
of our experience. She had been terrified into 
nausea, and had not closed her eyes after the 
shake until near dawn. The newspapers chron- 
icled the event as the worst shake in over 40 
years on the Island. 

My greatest diversion in St. Kitts was watch- 



204 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

ing the diving of the pelicans in front of the 
Sea Shore Hotel. These homely headed yet 
picturesque birds congregated in flocks, and 
often as many as seven circled and wheeled in 
one small space in the air, directly opposite our 
windows, and made their marvelous dive into 
the billows after fish. Reappearing they sat 
contentedly on the waves, until the fish was 
gulped into the food sack below the throat. 
Then they rose gracefully, made another circuit 
in the air, and again plunged down, one wing 
below the other until just above the billows, 
when a sudden head first attitude was taken, 
and the big ugly beak cleaved the water. 

St. Kitts has been for the greater portion of 
its existence since its discovery, a British pos- 
session. The French helped the English destroy 
the Caribs, and then the English drove out the 
French, and about all that remains of their 
occupancy, is the name of the town — Basseterre. 

As early as 1680, and as late as 1840, St. Kitts 
and its near young sister, St. Ives, were renowned 
for their brilliant social life. Hot Springs dis- 
covered at St. Ives, resolved that island into the 
fashionable Spa. 

And nowhere in European centers, could be 
found more splendor of apparel or greater gayety 
than on this little West Indian Island during its 
season of glory. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 205 

Looking on the streets of Basseterre St. 
Kitts or Charles Town Nevis, with their pre- 
ponderance of colored citizens and their paucity 
of interesting sights or people, it is hard to im- 
agine them filled with rich merchants, and the 
fair women folk of wealthy traders, with the 
bravely caparisoned officers of ships, and the 
pride of fashionable Europe's belles and beaux. 

After having studied many steamship guides 
for winter travelers, and talked with every man 
in Basseterre who knew what an ocean vessel 
was, Himself decided that our best course lay in 
taking the "Corona," due the day after our 
arrival, to New York, after eight long days at 
sea, reaching New York, March 13th. Now, we 
did not want to go back to New York so early. 
March is detestable in New York; but with yel- 
low fever in the lower islands, and with nothing 
to attract us for a long stay in St. Kitts, and 
with no chance to obtain our month's mail wait- 
ing at Bermuda, until we returned, we felt we 
should accept this alternative. So, as soon as 
the Corona came into the harbor, we proceeded 
to visit her, and find what accommodations could 
be secured. 

Not one inch of space was purchasable. Every 
stateroom and cabin was engaged. Walking 
through the ship we saw through the open door 
of a large stateroom, a pale attenuated young 



206 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

man lying on his back seemingly asleep. His 
face impressed me curiously, and I found my- 
self wondering after I left the ship, if the young 
man was ill. 

That afternoon at 2, the "Corona" sounded 
one whistle, yet the boat was not due to leave 
until midnight. A few hours later, at sunset, 
the officers and crew came ashore, bearing the 
corpse of the young man, a youth of 21 who had 
died at 2 p. m. of tuberculosis. It was in the 
vain hope of curing this malady that he had gone 
to the West Indian Islands. He was buried in 
Basseterre, and the tragic news was cabled to 
his waiting mother in Maryland. 

All that night, wonderful with the radiance 
of a full moon, I found my sleep broken with 
thoughts of this lonely death and burial. 

There is little in St. Kitts to interest strangers. 
It has a few old houses in the suburbs, and a 
drive of ten miles and a weary climb in the hot 
sun, brings one to the immense old Fort on Brim- 
stone Mountain, which cost the Island an enor- 
mous sum to erect and which never even smelled 
powder afterwards. Splendid views are to be 
obtained by those who care to climb any of the 
mountains back of Basseterre. But our St. 
Thomas adventure in that line of sight seeing 
proved sufficient for me. 

We satisfied ourselves with long restful hours 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 207 

in the public library at Basseterre, and with 
books and writing materials in our sea aired 
room at the hospitable home of Mrs. France, who 
in her youth had been one of the quality folk of 
Basseterre. On Sunday eve I astonished Him- 
self by announcing that I was going to church 
with Miss France. He wondered if I had ex- 
perienced a change of heart, and if I no longer 
found my own ideal of God and religion too big 
for "the creeds of churches," as I had always 
asserted. 

Then I explained a certain pretty story had 
been told me by Mistress France — oh, a very 
very pretty story, which had its setting in St. 
George's church, long and long ago, when Dame 
France, now a grandmother of well grown boys 
and girls, had been a child of ten. 

In those days West Indian maids married 
young; and so it befell that "Mary Jane" the 
sister of my hostess, was a beautiful widow at 
seventeen, after two years and eight months of 
married life. Now the maid who marries at 
fourteen does not experience a profound pas- 
sion and the wife who is widowed at seventeen 
does not desperately grieve, especially if her 
lord has been a gay English rake, and disloyal 
to his child bride, while clothing her in silken 
sheen. So no one need exclaim with wonder 
when it is said that the beautiful young face 



208 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

which peeped from its widow's cap, was not 
worn with sorrow or haggard with tears; but 
that it was dimpled, and prone to smile on small 
provocation, and that the gown of black crepe 
to the arm pits, was worn in a way which did 
not hide the adorable curves of budding young 
womanhood. 

Sitting demurely in her pew beside her aunt, 
who was no other than the wife of the honor- 
able Mr. Crook, President of the Island at St. 
Kitts, the child widow, while seemingly de- 
voutly attentive to the sermon, knew, never- 
theless, that the gaze of a handsome man of 
military bearing was fastened on her face, all 
through the long service. But not one glance 
from her sapphire eyes, did they accord him, 
although he waited to watch her pass down the 
aisle, and his own eyes were like two magnets 
as they focused on her lovely face. On the 
succeeding Sunday morning and the next and 
the next, the same man of military bearing 
appeared in the same pew at St. George's, 
evidently bent on the same purpose, to gaze at 
and admire sweet mistress Mary Jane. And 
then tongues began to wag! Gossips began to 
nod, and watch and tell tales! and predict 
events! and through it all Mistress Mary Jane 
kept her childlike look of innocence, and 
failed to understand the whispers, and the 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 209 

smiles and winks of Madame Grundy. Ap- 
pealed to for her opinion of the handsome 
stranger (who so it was discovered, came riding 
down 10 miles from Brimstone Fort each Sun- 
day to attend divine service) Mistress Mary Jane 
declared she had not sufficiently observed him 
to form an opinion, and forthwith she changed 
the topic of conversation to one, may be, less 
near her heart. But the next Sabbath, for- 
sooth, was there not a bit more starch in the 
flowing ends of her widow's cap ? And then one 
day there was great excitement at Lousach, 
the estate of Hon. Mr. Crook, President of St. 
Kitts, for a handsome young man in full dress 
uniform, came riding to the very door of the 
house and he dismounted, his sword clashing 
at his side, and tossed his reins to the groom: 
and, boldly as Lord Lochinvar who came from 
the West, he strode up the steps and raised the 
knocker and sent a reverberating echo through 
the big country house. Then his stalwart form 
disappeared within the opened door. 

Once within, the military stranger, produced 
his card, and asked for Mistress Crook, and 
Mistress Crook who had seen his approach from 
the window of her room, read his name and went 
below to receive the "Lieutenant of the Royal 
Engineers," stationed at the Fort on Brimstone 
Hill, and to hear his manly statement, "Mad- 

14 



210 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

ame, I come to sue for the heart of your beauti- 
ful niece, Mistress ,Mary Jane. I have loved her 
since first I saw her face in your pew at St. 
George's Church!" 

"But we do not know you sir — you have not 
been presented — Mistress Mary Jane is young." 

"Far too young to remain a widow," aptly 
interposed the Lieutenant of the Royal Engi- 
neers. "As for myself, I can produce, all re- 
quired credentials; and proof of my ability to 
give your fair niece the care she deserves. At 
least let me speak with her in person before you 
send me from your door." 

Then there was much hesitating and parley- 
ing, for Mistress Crook did not much approve 
of this unconventional way of wooing — tradi- 
tion being stronger in her nature than romance. 
But at length the wooer won, alas his one brief 
victory, over convention; and Mistress Mary 
Jane, clothed demurely in black and with a 
freshly starched widow's cap flapping its long 
ends as she walked, came beautiful and blush- 
ing, to meet the Lieutenant of the Royal Engi- 
neers and to listen to his plea. 

"I am ordered back to England" he said. 
"I must soon away. I would not go and leave 
you; I love you; it is as if I had always loved you. 
Believe me no man so loves twice in a lifetime; 
nor is any woman so loved twice. Be my wife 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 211 

and go with me to England." But Mistress 
Mary Jane, frightened it may be by such ve- 
hemence, and quite too young despite her 
widowhood to understand so great a passion, 
played the coy and indifferent maid; and said 
neither yea nor nay. 

Much I grieve not to end this pretty tale as 
it should end, with the beautiful widow becom- 
ing a beautiful bride, in the very church where 
she won the heart of the gallant Lieutenant of 
the Royal Engineers. 

But tradition and custom, and conventional- 
ity together, perhaps, with a foolish little child- 
widow's lack of individuality, prevailed over 
sentiment; prevailed too, over a strong man's 
love and desire. The gallant Lieutenant of the 
Royal Engineers sailed away to England alone. 

"Mary Jane" did not cease to be a widow 
until she was twenty-five. 

She lives today not a thousand miles from 
New York; an old lady — who despite her second 
widowhood, perchance carries a secret regret in 
her heart that she sent the handsome Lieuten- 
ant back to England alone. 

And so I went to St. George's church, and I 
fear I thought more of pretty Mistress Mary 
Jane and her military lover than I thought 
of the service of the Church of England. 



212 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



ANTIGUA. 

After three days in St. Kitts, we decided on 
taking a ship which would land us in Trinidad* 
and from there proceed by boat direct to 
New York. Antigua was our first port after 
leaving St. Kitts. 

The Island of Antigua was one of the fore- 
most to favor the emancipation of slaves. 

It is a beautiful and fertile Island 188 miles 
square with 20,000 acres under cultivation. 
Sugar is its main source of income. 

It does not possess the majesty of many of 
the West India Islands, having no mountains; 
but its roads are excellent for driving and wheel- 
ing, and many of its homes are attractive. 

Entering the harbor, the City of St. John 
makes a pleasing picture for the eye. Directly 
in the foreground lies a beautiful little island, 
perhaps half a mile from the landing pier at St. 
John's. It is an abrupt eminence a few acres 
in circumference, all under a fine state of culti- 
vation; and to the casual eye the buildings resem- 
ble a large country house with rambling wings. 

This is, in truth, an old fort, situated on what 
is known as Rat Island; and it has been for 
years the home of the lepers of Antigua. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 213 

There were thirty inmates when we saw the Is- 
land; all black. They are cared for by the Gov- 
ernment, and are given this comfortable Island 
with its agricultural occupations, and the best 
medical skill, to alleviate their miseries. 

They look out on a world of beauty, in a 
climate incomparably delightful. They are cer- 
tain of shelter, raiment and care as long as they 
live. But what sorrow and misery must be theirs 
nevertheless, knowing themselves doomed to 
lifelong imprisonment, and a slow dreadful 
death, upon this Island which deserves a more 
euphonious name. Nevertheless, instead of in- 
dulging in useless sympathy for these unfortu- 
nates, we should rejoice that science and skill 
and humanitarianism have so advanced, since 
Bible days, that such provision is made for the 
victims of this historic scourge. 

Redonda Rock, also near Antigua, called for 
our special attention. It is a thousand feet 
high, and devoid of all verdure. 

Yet two pretty young ladies on the ship 
which bore us from St. Thomas to St. Kitts, 
were en route to this barren rock. One was the 
daughter and one the niece of a Canadian man 
of affairs, who was engaged in exporting phos- 
phate of aluminum from this rock. He was the 
only white man there, and the young ladies 
would be obliged to reach the eerie where he 



214 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

made his so-called "home" by means of a large 
basket lowered and lifted by ropes. It was 
their intention to pass a whole month at, or 
rather on, Redonda; an experience out of the 
usual, if not interesting from any other point 
of view. 

Anchoring quite two miles out in the harbor 
of St. John, we were met and carried ashore by a 
Government tug, a welcome change from the 
dirty row boats, rowed by dirtier natives, which 
usually swarmed about the ships in harbor, like 
flies about a sweetmeat. 

Ofttimesthemen owning these boats came to 
blows in their efforts to obtain the patronage of 
sight seers, and once I was nearly knocked off 
the ship ladder, in a rough sea, by two contend- 
ing oarsmen, each declaring his boat had been 
engaged for my use. 

One tried to prevent my descent into the rival 
boat, and the other tried to force me into his; 
and Himself, standing behind me on the shaky 
ladder, was in immediate danger of being pre- 
cipitated into the sea by the fray. Fortunately 
peace was declared at that moment by the ap- 
pearance of two more travelers who engaged 
one boat, and so saved the day: and also saved 
two passengers from a possible undesired bath. 
At Antigua we found a good hotel, The Globe, 
and enjoyed the first appetizing breakfast of 
weeks. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 215 

There too we found a fine assortment of beads 
to add to our collection made in many lands. 
In all the West Indian Islands, the natives string 
the seeds of plants and fruits, into charming 
rosaries and chains: and at Antigua there was a 
large variety and some fascinating strings of 
small shells and fish scales besides. 

Haiti alone, of all the islands we visited, of- 
fered no such souvenirs to tourists. 

We found an excellent library in St. Johns, 
where we spent several hours. One old volume 
contained much material for thought relative 
to slavery days in Antigua. It told of a cer- 
tain plantation magnate who had his cook and 
his washwoman both chained to their labor, 
the chain reaching from kitchen and laundry to 
the house, and both chains attached to a weight 
of 56 lbs. This was to prevent the slaves from 
any attempt to escape into freedom. Here is a 
copy of a letter written from this island to a 
friend in England in the days of slavery: 

Antigua, Jan. 15, 1736. 
"Dear Friend: 

"We are in a great deal of trouble in this island. 
The burning of negroes, hanging them up on 
gibbets alive, racking them upon the wheel, etc., 
takes up all our time; from the 20th of October 
to this day, there have been destroyed sixty-one 



216 . SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

intelligent negroes, most of them carpenters, 
or tradesmen, coopers and masons. 

"I am almost dead with watching and working, 
as are many more. They were going to destroy 
all the white inhabitants of the island. 'Count/ 
the king of the negroes, 'Tomboy,' his general, 
and 'Hercules,' his lieutenant general, who were 
all racked upon the wheel, died with obstinacy. 
Mr. Archibald Hamilton's 'Harry,' after he 
was condemned, stuck himself with a knife in 
eighteen different places, four of which were 
mortal. Colonel Martin's 'Jemmy,' who was 
hung up alive from noon till eleven o'clock at 
night, was then taken down to give information. 
Col. Morgan's 'Ned,' after he had been hung 
up seven days and seven nights, his hands 
grew too small for his hand-cuffs, he got them 
out and raised himself, and fell down from a 
gibbet fifteen feet high, he was revived with 
cordials and broths in hopes to bring him to 
confess, but he would not, and was hung up 
again, and in a day and a night expired. Mr. 
Yeaman's 'Quasby Coouali' jumped out of the 
fire half burnt, but was thrown in again, and 
Mr. Lyon's 'Five,' jumped out of the fire, and 
promised to confess all, but it took no effect. 
In short, our island is in a poor, miserable con- 
dition, and I wish I could get any employment 
in England to do." 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 817 

In a Blackwood's Magazine of 1853, I found 
the following extract from a New York Herald 
of January 26, 1853: 

"A bill has been reported in the Virginia 
House of Delegates which provides for the ap- 
pointment of overseers, who are required to hire 
out at public auction, all free persons of color to 
the highest bidder, the amount to be paid into 
the State Treasury. This sum will be used to 
send all free people of color beyond the State 
Circuits. 

"After five years, all free people of color re- 
maining in the State will be sold into slavery to 
the highest bidder." 

Despite the "problem of the colored race" to- 
day, it seems to have been a more serious prob- 
lem in the days of slavery. 

Antigua has always since its colonization been 
the Governmental headquarters of the Leeward 
Islands. These Islands are St. Kitts, Nevis, 
Barbada, Montserrat, Dominica, Antigua, and 
the Virgin Islands. Some 12 miles from St. 
John's there is a nook in a wooded glen, known 
as "Ding-dong-dell." A legend attaches itself 
to this spot. 

In 1640, the wife of the Governor was ab- 
ducted by the Caribs and taken to the mountains 
of Dominica. The Governor recovered his wife 
after some days, but in a brief period he lost his 



218 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

mind, brooding over the thought of her possible 
fate while a prisoner: and one version of the 
legend has it that he built a lonely house in 
Ding-dong-dell and compelled his wife to live 
out her life in this solitary spot alone. Another 
states that the wife withdrew to this spot of her 
own wish. Nothing remains of the house now, 
nor of the "Dell" but a tangled wood; yet the 
story evidently sprung from some tragic oc- 
currence connected with the days of continual 
tragedy in the West Indian Islands. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS »19 



DOMENICA-MARTINIQUE. 

Were I to give my impressions of Rosseau, 
the capital of Domenica, I should say simply 
that it was a hot, steaming mud hole, surround- 
ed by miserable hovels, and entirely inhabited 
by barefooted negroes. Quite as accurate a 
description as that given by many a foreign 
tourist who makes a flying visit to America. 

We spent two hours in Domenica, and they 
were all the hours of rain we saw between Ja- 
maica and Trinidad. It was early morning, 
only negroes were in evidence, and the town 
looked bedraggled and forlorn. Meantime the 
streets were noticeably free from litter of all 
kinds, and the shops were neat and orderly. 

We could not, however, imagine a civilized 
white person living in this town and when told 
that 300 whites and 8,000 colored people formed 
its population, we wondered where the white 
contingency made its abiding place. 

A few hours later, our table companions from 
the "President," the corporation attorney from 
Denver, and the M. of P. from Manitoba, joined 
us on the "Dahomey" after a sojourn of several 
days in Rosseau. 

Now imagine our surprise, when they related 



220 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

this tale: Arriving in Rosseau at early candle 
light, they were directed to the home of Mrs. 
Gordon, as the desirable hostelry of the town. 
Entering the open door they found themselves 
in the presence of a goodly party of white 
people in full evening dress. Through a vista 
in an adjoining apartment was discerned a 
table artistically appointed ready for ten or 
twelve guests and sounds of music from some 
hidden recess fell upon ears, accustomed to the 
screams of boatmen and the shriek of steamboat 
whistles. Until a late hour at night they 
heard music and revelry, and the pleasant 
tones of cultured men and women in converse. 

Added to this, they were provided with the 
luxuries of running water, a plunge and a 
shower bath, all the comforts of civilization, 
left behind in Jamaica. It was a matter of 
utter astonishment to learn that this little mud 
hole town of Rosseau possessed the best water 
system of any of the Leeward Islands. But 
the explanation was simple. 

Domenica has the heaviest rain fall of all the 
West Indian Islands. Three hundred inches 
in one year is not unusual. Given that 
as a base of action, a few enterprising citi- 
zens supplied the brain and energy to 
provide Rosseau with water privileges. Do- 
menica is a volcanic island, and its scenery, 




Dominica. — Street in Roseau. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 221 

so declared our friends, is more magnificent 
and awe inspiring than the scenery of 
Jamaica. But to enjoy these spectacles pro- 
vided by opulent nature, indolent man has 
made no such roadways as are found all over 
the beautiful Island of Jamaica. Indeed there 
are few wheeled vehicles in Domenica; all jour- 
neying is done on horseback or on foot. 

Like Jamaica, the island is remarkably free 
from serpents and insects. 

The white population of this lovely Island of 
Domenica hardly exceeds one per cent. 

The Imperial Department of Agriculture has 
made the Botanical Gardens of Rosseau famous. 
Domenica was once owned by the French. The 
great battle between Rodney and De Grave, took 
place near Rosseau, in 1782. The French fleet 
was destroyed and since that time Domenica 
has belonged to the English. 

It seems a misfortune that with the wonderful 
fertility and healthful climate, and superb 
scenery, that it cannot be made as attractive 
to white settlers as Jamaica. 



222 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



MARTINIQUE 

Our ship paused almost within voice call of 
the dead city of St. Pierre. This was an act of 
courtesy on the part of our captain, who changed 
the regular route to gratify the wish of his pas- 
sengers to see the victim of Mt. Pelee's wrath. 
The top of Mt. Pelee was as usual hidden in a 
deep gray cloud. Yet even so it appeared un- 
utterably sinister and forbidding to our sight; 
but what words can describe the impression 
made by that skeleton city where 40,000 people 
were destroyed in a few moments' time! 

Until the catastrophe at Messina this was the 
most colossal disaster which had occurred through 
any cataclysm of nature since the flood. 

St. Pierre before the eruption of Mt. Pelee, 
was the most unique island of the West Indies. 
It had retained the spirit of France to a curious 
degree; and its women had perpetuated the 
French characteristics with an added beauty 
and fascination peculiar to the Creole; while the 
African mixture was refined by the Latin inocu- 
lation. 

On this island, Josephine, the Empress of 
France, was born; and it was on St. Pierre that 
Lafcadio Hearne lavished some of his most 
opulent words of praise. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 223 

In St. Pierre one found less of the colored ele- 
ment, and more of "color," to use an artistic 
term, than in any of the other West Indian 
cities. 

Renowned for the beauty of its women, it is 
not uncharitable to believe that it was also re- 
nowned for its absence of high ideas of moral- 
ity. 

Morality, as we understand the word, and the 
Tropics are antagonistic terms in any part of the 
world. The equator is the girdle of Venus; and 
on her altars of pleasure, humanity is prone to 
offer up all its sterner principles. It may not 
be true that Martinique was the wickedest city 
in the world, as has been said; but since through 
all West Indian cities, licentiousness stalks 
naked and unashamed (as he who passes 
through their thoroughfares for even a day can- 
not fail to know), it is a probable supposition 
that Mt. Pelee buried more vice than virtue 
under its boiling tons of lava 

While not one home or house was spared, 
the white pedestal of the statue of the Virgin, 
stood unmolested and unscarred. It shines 
there today, just above and aside from the 
gray ghost of a town, the one structure small 
or large, sacred or profane, that has survived 
the holocaust. 

To the purely scientific and philosophical 



224 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

mind, it seems merely an odd accident of fate. 
For the superstitious mind, it carries a deeper 
significance. 

More desolate and appalling than the ruins 
of old Rome, Pompeii, or the Herculaneum, this 
shadowy city of Martinique seemed to us, proba- 
bly because its people were of our day and gen- 
eration, and all the intimate details of its des- 
truction were familiar to us. 

Just such a fate may any day befall any of 
the cities, set at the base of volcanic mountains. 

There are no extinct volcanoes. 

There are only slumbering volcanoes. 

When our ship reached Barbadoes, we were 
told it would remain in harbor the entire day. 
Passengers could go ashore and visit the town 
if they desired to do so, despite the fact that 
yellow fever prevailed to a slight degree on 
the island. 

Having no fear of epidemics of any kind, and 
desiring some personal impressions of Barba- 
does, I expressed a wish to join the party pre- 
paring to go ashore immediately after breakfast. 
But here Himself laid down the law, in his own 
gentle yet decisive manner. 

"We do not set foot in Barbadoes," he said. 
"We run no foolish risk of an encounter with 
the yellow fever mosquito." 

"But she is a lazy female insect, and never 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 225 

stirs out till sun set," I said. "A resident of the 
Island has told me all about her. She sits 
around the whole day in a striped mother hub- 
bard gown, and goes out just at nightfall to fill 
herself with blood. It is not an evil murderous 
instinct either, which prompts the poor thing! 
It is purely maternal affection. She cannot lay 
her eggs until she has fed on blood." 

"Well, at the risk of being thought heartless 
and cruel to the mother mosquito and refusing her 
sustenance for her family, I must decline to go 
ashore or to let you go." Himself replied. Of 
course that settled the question. While I 
thought he was unnecessarily cautious, there 
could be no pleasure in going ashore unless the 
pleasure was mutual. 

So we remained on the boat with several other 
cautious travelers, and received our impres- 
sions of Barbadoes from the more adventurous 
investigators who returned in mid-afternoon, 
with the usual interesting tales intended to make 
stay-at-homes ashamed and envious. 

But when we landed in the harbor at Trini- 
dad our day of triumph came. Only those who 
had not gone ashore at Barbadoes were absolved 
from medical inspection and allowed to land at 
once; and all those who had touched foot on the 
quarantined Island were obliged to deposit $20 
with the health officer as a guarantee that they 

15 



226 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

would report every day for 4 days at 9 A. M., at 
the harbor office in Trinidad to be examined for 
evidences of the fever. 

So Himself was, as usual, right and, as usual, 
my reward came from obeying him, even though 
that word had been omitted from our marriage 
service. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 227 



TRINIDAD. 

When nature indulged in one of her great 
cataclysms, and produced the West India 
Islands, she bestowed gracious attention upon 
the approach to Trinidad. Never any port 
offered a richer feast to beauty seeking eyes, 
than this entrance to the Bay of Paria presented 
on the morning of our passage through the 
Bocas. There are two of these passages, the 
two "mouths" of the Bay of Paria. Our ship 
entered by the Little Bocas, the most beautiful, 
but only safe in daylight, owing to its many 
hidden reefs. The little Bocas is a long corridor 
between majestic rocks, leading from the Carib- 
bean Sea into the Bay of Paria. The view from 
the ship as it enters the Bay presents an em- 
barrassment of riches. "Another Paradise," 
you think as the panorama of exquisite islands 
and alluring villas unfolds with the gleaming 
towers of the Port of Spain in the distance. 

"What lofty residence is that set on a sea 
washed island in the foreground?" you ask, and 
the answer awakens you to the fact that you are 
not entering the Port of Paradise, but the har- 
bor of sinning souls. The lofty residence, is the 
Convict Prison of Trinidad from which no es- 



228 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

cape is possible, guarded as it is by schools of 
man-eating sharks, the police patrol of the 
Caribbean Sea. You breathe a little prayer, 
"Peace to all created things," and turn your eyes 
to fairer structures. On beautiful islands, out 
of the embrace of loving palms, smile restful 
bungalows. For a song you may possess one 
of these for a month, if you will — and learn the 
meaning of real idleness. Or you may pass them 
by, as we did and push on to the Port of Spain. 
After distracting you siren-like, with its beauty, 
the Bay of Paria gives you the most difficult 
landing in the world. Owing to shallow water, 
ships anchor two miles from the Port of Spain, 
and passengers, and baggage and cargoes are 
carried ashore in row boats. With a rough sea 
below and a broiling sun above, the picturesque 
phases of the situation are sometimes forgotten 
by travel worn wanderers. Not until the broad 
cool verandas of the Queens Park Hotel are 
reached, does nervous irritation with boatmen, 
and cabmen give way to nobler sentiments of 
appreciation of scenery and climate. 

Never since we left our beloved Hotel Titch- 
field, at Port Antonio (joy and success attend it) 
had we found so much comfort and beauty com- 
bined, as here in the Queens Park Hotel at 
Trinidad. 

Our rooms faced the North, with an imposing 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 229 

mountain background. Between the mountains 
and hotel, lay the famed Savanna, a curious 
center, where fashion, cow pasturage, a race 
track for horses, a grand stand, a foot ball field, 
and a small cemetery, all play their part. Every 
afternoon from four to six, the smart people of 
Port-of-Spain's 60,000 inhabitants, drove about 
the Savanna, dressed in their best attire. Al- 
ways the peaceful-eyed cows wandered over its 
ample precincts, and grazed upon its rich grass 
(at one shilling a head per month, to the benefit 
of the City Treasury). On certain days great 
races filled the grandstand with the lovers of 
that sport, and on the Saturday afternoon fol- 
lowing our arrival a football contest between the 
Protestant and Roman Catholic teams, made 
the Savanna a scene of such noisy festivity that 
wads of cotton were necessary to save ear drums 
from injury. I have heard the cheers of twenty- 
thousand people at great Yale-Harvard games 
at Yale Field, New Haven, but never such a 
din and furor of noise as cannonaded the air 
on the Savanna at Port of Spain, Trinidad. 

Trinidad is only 10 degrees from the Equator, 
and consequently we expected a climate of tor- 
rid temperature. Hot it is — broiling hot away 
from the ever blowing mountain winds, but so 
cool and refreshing in this breeze, that one who 
goes to Trinidad in search of winter comfort 



230 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

may always expect to find it, if he will keep out of 
the noon-day sun and in the current of air, 
which cools the heated blood, but never gives 
colds. And always are the nights beautiful 
with conditions for sleep. The temperature 
ranges from 75 to 88 in the winter season. Dearly 
as I love Jamaica, I can understand how one 
who sought distraction as well as summer climate 
might find a winter in Trinidad more interesting 
than a winter in Jamaica. No other city in the 
West Indies can compete with the Port of Spain 
as a city of entertainment. It is cosmopolitan 
in its variety' of nationalities, and one hears 
French, Spanish and English all spoken in the 
streets and cafes. I have referred in another 
chapter to that intangible something we call 
"charm," which hangs about the Hawaiian Is- 
lands; a charm which increases the further one 
goes toward the Orient, I am told. A charm 
which lends a halo to poverty and even misery 
and dirt, in Southern France and Italy, and 
Sicily, and which encircled the strange and un- 
civilized town of Tangier like a cloud of incense. 
The charm is not found in Germany; it is not 
found in America, England or Holland; and it 
never exists where the African race is dominant. 
The East Indian coolie contingency, despite 
its low caste characteristics lends a touch 
of it to Jamaica. A still larger and more 




Trinidad. — Coolie Woman at Door of Her House. 




Trinidad. — Egrets in the Garden of Queens Park Hotel. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 231 

prosperous population of these people gives 
a picturesque individuality to the streets 
of Trinidad. One day I saw a sketch for a color 
artist on the main shopping thoroughfare of Port 
of Spain. A Coolie woman, slender and erect, 
passed by, her graceful shawl drapery of pure 
white, fringed with gold hanging diagonally from 
her pretty head to below the left knee. She 
wore a thin gold hoop in her classic nose — the 
engagement ring of the Coolies — and in her left 
nostril shone a jewel set in dull gold — the mar- 
riage seal. Crossing her path, came a colossal 
Juno in ebony: a black woman clothed in a 
gown of screaming scarlet over which were scat- 
tered white polka dots the size of a nickel. A 
bright green bandana turban, and a saffron 
yellow neckerchief completed the costume 
which was far more effective and even artistic, 
than those hideous cheap suits sold at every 
bargain counter in America. Just beyond 
walked a Coolie man all in white, his greyhound 
legs showing bare and graceful below his short 
trouser trunks. Black women balancing heavy 
baskets on their heads were everywhere. And 
further on just boarding a car was a girl, beauti- 
ful as a dream of old Castile, exquisite in face 
and form, clothed in dainty mull and lace, but 
with the blood of some slave ancestor staining 
her beauty to unwashable brown. Of this 



233 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

tragedy of mixed blood in the West Indies and 
all it entails, only those who visit the islands 
can conceive. Out of the 60,000 inhabitants of 
Port of Spain, a scant 1,000 absolutely devoid 
of African ancestry can be found, and far happier 
is he or she whose unmistakable type lends no 
chance for denial, than one whose modified 
features and paler color, leads him to the hope- 
less and never-ending effort at emulating what 
he is not and never can be, an Anglo-Saxon. 
It is not considered good form to talk of "color" 
in Trinidad, and those residents who speak 
frequent disparagements of the black race often 
hide a turned down leaf in running over their 
ancestral books — a leaf which does not bear close 
inspection. Alas and alas, that even unto the 
third and fourth generation descends the sin of 
the white man who took his black slave to con- 
cubinage. Trinidad is an island of vast re- 
sources. Its wonderful Pitch Lake yields 800 
tons a day of this valuable road-making ingre- 
dient; and its cocoa plantations are among the 
greatest and most fertile in the world. 

The great need of Trinidad is a good mountain 
hotel, such as Jamaica supplies at Moneague and 
Mandeville. Properly built, properly construct- 
ed and made accessible by a good road, and a 
motor car service, a mountain hotel would prove 
a paying investment the year around at Trini- 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 233 

dad. In the winter it would be patronized by 
tourists, in trie summer by its many wealthy 
residents. Then indeed Trinidad would become 
a well equipped rival of Jamaica as a winter re- 
sort for Americans. Trinidad has never suf- 
fered from earthquake or hurricane; its one mis- 
fortune lies in not having rendered itself immune 
from the scourge of yellow fever, which at inter- 
vals makes its dreaded visitation upon the island. 
May the spirit of our ever lamented Col. War- 
ren, the Colossus of Hygiene, inspire some great 
man to rise and cleanse all the West Indies from 
this danger, as he himself cleansed Havana 
before he passed on to the realms of eternal 
purity and beauty. 



234 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



THE BIRDS OF TRINIDAD. 



"QU'EST-CB-QU'IL-DIT?" 

Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit, Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit, 
Listening there as we talk together, 

Bold eavesdropper in yonder tree, 
Never abashed by the hottest weather, 

How do you happen to make so free, 

With each newcomer, Sir "Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit"? 

Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit, Qu-est-ce-qu'il-dit, 
Strutting about in your vest of yellow, 

Why do you ask what he said to me, 

Why should I tell you, impertinent fellow? 

Two is a company, can't you see — 

And three is a multitude, "Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit." 

All my life birds have been closely associated 
with dear experiences and memories. There 
was a meadow lark and a bobolink and a thrush 
who played each his important role in my early 
life on a Wisconsin prairie, and to hear those 
birds today is to renew the lost emotions of 
early youth, its imagined sorrows, its imagined 
joys, its real hopes, dreams and ambitions. 
There was a first listening to the Southern 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 235 

mocking bird — under peculiar circumstances in 
a romantic environment, and always that en- 
vironment, and those circumstances exist again 
when the mocking bird sings. 

The Ting-a-ling bird must ever mean the 
little English inn on the summit of Mount Dia- 
bolo, at Meneague, Jamaica, and the "boom- 
boom" of a native bird at dawn in the moun- 
tains of Hawaii is part and parcel of my mem- 
ories of an adorable Winter in the bungalow in 
Honolulu. So now, blending into the recollec- 
tions of fair torrid days of rest, at the end of a 
long month of wanderings, is the sweet, imper- 
tinent voice of the "Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit" bird of 
Trinidad. I had heard of this bird, wearing a 
brown coat and a yellow vest, and flying from 
tree to tree with his ever repeated question, 
"What does he say?" — uttered in three distinct 
French syllables, and I had wondered if it was 
the vivid imagination of some French tourist 
who first gave this interpretation of the bird's 
note. 

But I had not been an hour in my room at 
the Queens Park Hotel when, just as Himself 
had completed a remark to me, I heard the 
question of this bit of feathered curiosity, tossed 
down from a branch of a tall tree. 

"Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit? Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit?" 
pausing just a brief second after each inquiry as 



236 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

if waiting for an answer. Much quarreling and 
wrangling and disputing I heard in that same 
tree afterward among the birds; and did not 
doubt that many exclusive and reserved mem- 
bers of feathered society were indignant at the 
intrusive curiosity of "Qu'est-ce-qu'il-dit." 

Glancing down from a south window on a 
little garden between two wings of the Queens 
Park Hotel, I one day spied what looked like 
caricatures of fowls done in pottery. There 
were seven of these images, all snow white, each 
standing in a different posture, like the storks 
on a Japanese frieze or jar. Confident they 
were china fowls, and wondering at this peculiar 
idea of garden decoration. I suddenly started 
in surprise when first one and then another of 
the china bird "images" moved. 

They were all living "Egrets," or white her- 
ons. 

The nearer I approached the more unreal 
these birds seemed; less like china, but more 
like phantoms. Never have I seen any other 
living thing so ethereal and ghostlike as these 
fowls. Their necks were little larger than pipe- 
stems! Their legs resembled knitting needles, 
and their alabaster bodies looked more fragile 
than the leaf of a calla lily. Their almost color- 
less and unwinking eyes added still greater un- 
reality to the general effect. Yet were they 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 237 

beautiful beyond description, with that beauty 
which lies ofttimes in the grotesque and unusual. 
These fowls were in perfect health and were two 
years old. They had been secured from nests 
in the marshes of Trinidad where they breed, 
and had grown and thrived on their natural 
food of raw fish and raw meat ; a most astonish- 
ing diet for such ephemeral looking creatures. 

In Trinidad where these birds are most 
numerous, no suffering is connected with the 
process of securing the delicate feather, known 
as the Aigrette. 

The taking of the aigrette from under the 
birds' wings is no more painful than the plucking 
of the ostrich plume or the elimination of a hair 
from the human head. Unless the aigrette is 
pulled by man, it turns black and is removed 
by the bird herself. The fishermen who secure 
these aigrettes for merchants do so in a man- 
ner so adroit that the bird never knows what 
has happened until it is over. 

The men wade into the marshes to their arm- 
pits; they place a large tropic leaf the size of a 
parasol over their heads. On this leaf is scat- 
tered raw meat or fish to attract the birds, and 
as soon as they alight the fisherman reaches 
through the leaf, grasps their legs, quickly pulls 
out the aigrettes and lets the birds go. 

The killing of birds to secure their plumage 



238 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

for hats is an abomination and a shame to all 
womankind in the eyes of the Creator. Un- 
fortunately in other parts of the West Indies 
this slaughter goes on in the interests of fashion: 
and the aigrette which decorates the beauty 
means suffering and death to our feathered kin, 
in nine instances out of ten. 

The owner of the white heron told me an 
amusing story of the vanity of these ethereal 
creatures. 

"If you place a large mirror before them," 
he said, "they will all congregate and stand the 
entire day taking different poses, and evidently 
admiring themselves." I saw several of them 
during my stay at the hotel poised on the 
edge of a large basin of water gazing into its 
surface where their delicate and grotesque 
beauty was reflected. 

Himself solved to his own satisfaction the 
phantom quality of these birds. 

"I think," he said, "they are the souls of black 
women whose whole lives were one impassioned 
plea to the Creator to be white. So they have 
come back to the land where they toiled and 
suffered — white, idle and happy in being al- 
lowed to contemplate their snowy reflections." 

Who knows? 




Trinidad. — The Prison Island in Harbor. 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 239 



CARIBBEAN TRAGEDIES. 

The Caribbean Sea, and the West India Is- 
lands have been scenes of innumerable dramas 
and tragedies. The buccaneer, the pirate and 
the slave owner who were actors in these scenes, 
no longer exist. 

All those dramas of land and sea are in the far 
past. With the exception of the "Black Re- 
public" there is no bloodshed, no slaughter of 
human beings, no pirating and buccaneering, 
or looting of towns, taking place on the shores 
of the Caribbean Seas. 

But there is a silent tragedy continually being 
enacted on every one of the West Indian Islands; 
a tragedy which must continue to be enacted 
for hundreds of years to come and must affect 
thousands and tens of thousands of unborn 
souls. 

I refer to the tragedy of mixed blood. When 
the Spanish race brought over the first African 
slaves, in 1509, miscegenation, the greatest evil 
which ever befel the black or white race, took 
root in the West Indies. With it began the 
deterioration of the African race, and with it 
began such a series of calamities and sorrows 
for the world, as only a series of volumes could 
contain if related. 



240 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

I 

It is a curious fact that the one race in the 
world which universally strives to conceal and 
deny itself when mixed with other bloods, is 
the African. All over America, may be found 
proud families who boast of some Indian fore- 
bears. To descend from Pocahontas is thought 
to be a distinction. So great a distinction that 
pretense often lays claim to what veracity could 
not prove, if the family tree were climbed for 
evidence. The Chinese, the Japanese, the Pole- 
nesian — all pride themselves upon their blood. 
A beautiful woman in Paris when asked of her 
nationality, tells with evident pleasure that her 
mother was half Polynesian, half Chinese, and 
that through her American father the character- 
istics of three nationalities belong to her. 

But never has any instance been known where 
concealment was in any degree possible,or where 
the question was open to the least doubt, that 
one with African blood boasted of the fact. 

It is difficult to understand why this should 
be so. The Indian tribes in the West Indies — 
the Carib's especially — were savage cannibals, 
quite as barbarous as any of the Africans. They 
boiled their enemies, ate their flesh, and saved 
the fat to annoint their children and they held 
women in low esteem, making them little more 
than beasts of burden. Yet any man or woman 
in the West Indies who possesses a few drops of 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 241 

Carib blood hastens to inform you of the fact; 
and any man or woman in whose veins runs a di- 
lution of negro blood; would rather die than own 
to it, if denial will lead to possible belief on the 
listener's part. 

In the effort at concealment continually being 
made in the West Indies by people descended 
from a mulatto, or an octoroon, or a still more 
remote type, lies the tragedy of the age. Even 
among the mulattoes who show all the African 
characteristics, this ceaseless effort goes on. 
Woolly locks are parted and pulled into pitiful 
bunches and fastened with combs and hidden by 
knots of ribbon, and brown faces are powdered, 
and black hands concealed under white gloves, 
all bespeaking the heartaching and breaking 
passion of the poor woman to make herself what 
she can never be. 

The pride of any woman of African descent, 
in straight hair, causes her to display such 
locks to their utmost, and on every possible 
occasion. Women may be seen in public 
places with loosely falling hair, or with only a 
ribbon tied about the unbraided mass. Often 
their favorite diversion is to sit at an open win- 
dow, brushing and combing these unkinked 
locks, so happy in their possession that African 
features, and a mahogany skin are for the time 
forgotten. 

16 



242 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

The white man's sin is everywhere evident in 
the West Indies ; and where it is not evident, it 
often lurks, a greater menace to happiness than 
when unconcealed. 

In one of the West Indian schools, among 
500 children of varied hues (all colored) a boy 
of ten was noticeable for the pale yellow of his 
hair, the startling whiteness of his skin, and 
the blue of his eyes. Inquiry proved, how- 
ever, that he came from African stock. Well 
educated and placed in western circles, he 
might easily at the age of 25, pass as a white 
man. 

Regarded from any standpoint the life of 
such a boy is full of the elements of tragedy. 
If he associates with people of color, he will be 
regarded as a white man out of his proper 
sphere and if he conceals his lineage and mar- 
ries a white woman, another of these sorrowful 
dramas will be enacted which are constantly 
occurring in the West Indies. While I was 
there one of the American Consuls received a 
letter from the States regarding the family of a 
young lady visiting in the North. The girl is 
beautiful, a slender brunette, and highly accom- 
plished. Her family has money and position. 
While the letter gave no reason for the inquiry, 
the Consul understood that the young woman 
had interested some son of a Northern mother 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 243 

who felt impelled to investigate the girl's lin- 
eage. 

"Of course I declined to mix in such a purely- 
personal matter," the Consul said. "In my 
position it would be wholly out of place, yet, 
while I could have said only the most compli- 
mentary things of this young girl and her im- 
mediate family, I would have been obliged, if 
forced to tell the truth, to say that her father's 
ancestry led into the domain of color. His 
grandfather, a red haired Scotchman, took a 
handsome mulatto slave for a mistress. One 
son she bore him was light colored and very 
bright and the Scotchman (who was married 
and the father of several girls) adopted his octo- 
roon son and raised him with every advantage. 
This octoroon was the grandfather of the young 
girl now residing in the States." 

"But there would really be no danger in a 
union with such a remote descendant of the 
race," I said, "surely the blood becomes so 
diluted that none of its unpleasant character- 
istics would be liable to appear." 

"So I thought," the Consul replied, "until I 
came here to live. But I have been a personal 
witness to several proofs to the contrary. For 
instance, one English girl met and married the 
son of a wealthy West Indian planter, during 
the first year of my Consulship. The father 



244 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

of the young man was born in England and had 
married on the Island. The son was sent to 
England and educated. After his marriage he 
settled here. One year later a blonde baby was 
born to them; The image of its mother. But 
in two years time an undeniable negro boy ap- 
peared, dark skinned, flat nosed and kinky 
haired. The young father himself had been 
kept in ignorance of his mother's mulatto an- 
cestry." 

Of course these cases are exceptional. Where 
one child "throws back" to use a stock breeding 
term, and reveals the African traits, a score are 
born where the blood has become diluted and 
the negro has become extinct in the race. 

I have no doubt that in hundreds of proud 
families in the Southern States today, and in- 
deed in families scattered all over America, 
there runs a vein of negro blood, all unknown 
to them. 

But so long as the negro himself wants to 
change his color, so long as the mulatto and 
the quadroon and the octoroon seek to obliter- 
ate all evidences of their African origin, this 
subject of mixed bloods will make sorrow in the 
West Indies. 

Born of great volcanic labor pains of Mother 
Earth, passionate creations of some vio- 
lent force in nature, these beautiful Islands 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 245 

seem themselves like gorgeous Octoroons, des- 
tined to tragic experiences. Earthquakes, hur- 
ricanes, tidal waves, eruptions and revolutions 
in rotation periodically disturb their brief 
seasons of repose. Never do they know real 
peace, real calm, absolute safety, and con- 
tinual prosperity. 



&46 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 



THE HOMEWARD VOYAGE 

The beauty and restf ulness of the Queens Park 
Hotel, and the charm of Trinidad, tempted us to 
linger until every vestige of Winter's reign de- 
parted from New York. 

But after ten weeks of travel in tropical climate 
(and with the recollection of two boats where 
life had not been a dream of comfort), a desirable 
ship for our home going was the first considera- 
tion. 

And so it resulted that we set sail one hot, Hot 
March morning, for the eight days voyage to 
New York, on board the Surinam, a Holland 
American boat, that proved to be the perfection 
of cleanliness and comfort. 

There were but eight passengers, and only one 
woman beside myself. She never appeared at 
the meal hour, being in deep sorrow over the 
death of a relative; so again I found myself 
hostess at the ship's table; the handsome officers 
and six men passengers, composing our dinner 
party each evening. 

The voyage was not marked by that same 
spirit of comraderie, however, which makes the 
memory of the cruise on "The President" so 
lasting. Possibly the men were less interesting, 



SAILING SUNNY SEAS 247 

and possibly the fact that we were all sailing 
back to chill Northern weather, and into cold 
Atlantic waters, instead of forth to summer lands, 
in suuny seas, explains the difference. Our 
holiday experiences were behind, instead of be- 
fore us; we were all bent upon individual pur- 
poses, instead of united in one idea of relaxation 
and pleasure, as when bound for the West In- 
dian shores. 

Then too, with the excitement of the winter's 
cruise over, I began to realize its hardships, and 
the depleting effects of so much physical exer- 
tion in a tropical climate. I was conscious of 
being very tired. 

With every expectation of happy reunions 
and joyous hours ahead of me, I yet felt a pecul- 
iar and unaccustomed depression of spirits as 
we neared New York. 

To amuse myself I tried a little card trick, 
asking whether good luck and good cheer awaited 
me on shore, and invariably the answer came in 
the negative. 

A few hours after our arrival we learned of 
the illness of a near and dear friend, one whose 
lovely face was the last to smile farewell to us 
from the dock, as we had set forth on the Tagus 
in early January. 

A few weeks after our arrival in New York, 
she too sailed out suddenly, at early dawn to the 



248 SAILING SUNNY SEAS 

Port of all Souls. Alone and with no voice to 
bid her bon voyage, and with no hand to wave 
her farewell, she went upon her long journey, 
leaving inexpressible sorrow in the hearts of 
those who loved her. And they were many. 



TO ONE WHO WENT AWAY. 

Martha, the world seems smaller, since you went 
And there are lonesome places everywhere; 
Though Spring walks with us, and the earth is 

fair. 
Accustomed tasks bring not their old content: 
Life wears her robe as one who hides a rent, 
And Pleasure smiles as one who masks despair. 
Yet, since your going, something new and rare, 
With all the elements of Space is blent. 

There is a friendlier feeling, in the far 

Unmeasured distances that lie above, 

And round about the earth. Each radiant star 

Seems like a center of responding love. 

The Silences have grown more eloquent, 

Since in the stillness of the Dawn, you went. 

The End. 




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